The Astounding Naruto Fox
by Flux Casey
Summary: He stole to provide for his family but crimes have punishments. And his is... to go to monster-killing school. Go figure.
1. Chapter 1

In the valley on the eastern edge of the kingdom of Atlas lived three farmers. Their names were Burnie, Blaine and Brandon and they were the foulest of men.

These farmers had done well for themselves, each of them producing more food for the kingdom than any other farm. It could be said that any man, woman or child in the kingdom has eaten food provided by all three at least once. And most were fed without the farmers ever knowing about it.

_Under_ the valley on the eastern edge of the kingdom of Atlas lived a great many faunus. To you or me, the eight families living there would be the strangest people you ever saw. People with the features of animals. Dog ears, cat ears, rabbit ears, whiskers, one even with a long striped tail! And there was one among this mismatched mob who had an appearance all his own. Sunshine yellow hair, two pointed ears atop his head, three whiskers on each cheek and a fox-like grin that gave away his species. Dressed in a ragged old brown tailcoat, this was the faunus' leader. And his name was Naruto.

Naruto was younger than you may expect. Nearing his seventeenth year of life, looking after this community of animal-like people was a great amount of responsibility. It was not as if he were the eldest there. There were some in their second decade, some their third. But these people were parents. Their own young children had to be the priority. But Naruto? Naruto was alone. No parents, no children, no siblings. No family. And because of this, Naruto decided to himself that all of these people, every single one of them was a member of his family and he would do anything to keep them safe and happy.

And this leads us to what makes Naruto the best leader that the small faunus community could ask for. When Naruto the fox decided he would do something, he followed through no matter what.

The farmers were heartless men and refused to feed the faunus no matter what was offered. Work, trade or pay the three would say as though with one voice 'NO'. They would say the next time the faunus came calling they would be met by shotguns.

That was fine by Naruto's view. If the men would not trade like civilised folk, the farmers would be the ones losing out. The faunus needed that food and they would get it.

And so, as dark would fall on the city, Naruto the fox would creep onto the farms, into the henhouses, the sheep pens, the pigsties, the wheat, corn and rice fields, and out would come a multitude of mirror images of Naruto, each carrying an animal or yield of crops.

And so it would go. For weeks, for months, the faunus would eat happily and the farmers would be none the wiser. Until one night it was ended by the roar of a shotgun blast.

Even if he hadn't heard the gunfire, Naruto would have known one of his doppelgängers was destroyed by it. The doubles that were furthest from the farmhouse ran with whatever they could carry. The closer ones made for the house to keep the enraged farmer Burnie busy.

Naruto escaped once again. But they were on to him now. They would be ready for him if he tried again.

Little did he know, this would be the least of his problems.

-(-)-

"Those ANIMALS!" Burnie yelled as he stormed into Blaine's home, slamming the door behind him.

"Swolefather who art in the iron temple, swoled be thy frame" another voice echoed around the barely furnished home, interspersed with grunts of effort. "Thy swoledom come, thy will be done, in the deadlift as well as in the squat rack."

"Blaine you meathead! Get out here! We have a problem!" Burnie yelled louder.

"I am in the middle of worship, you heathen! I knew you to be an agent of Broki!" the voice yelled back. "Give us this day our daily whey-", he continued.

"Oh, for the love of-!" Burnie hated when Blaine got like this and this might have been the worst time for it. Still, there wasn't much Burnie could do about it. The last time he tried to interrupt the musclebound farmer's 'worship' he got put through a wall. And then another wall. Instead he found his way to where Blaine was training and waited for him to finish.

"For thine is the swoledom, the power clean, and the glute ham raise. Forever and ever. Wheymen." Blaine spoke, finishing his prayer and lowering a barbell (with a disturbing amount of weight on it) to the floor. "Now, what was it you wanted?"

Through grinding teeth, Burnie told him. "I just caught one of those damn beasts stealing our livestock. Dozens of our animals gone to feed those creatures."

"Dozens?" Blaine asked with raised eyebrows. "I feel conflicted. To carry so many animals he must be a follower of the ways of Brodin like myself. Tell me, how were his delts? His traps?"

"Wha..." Burnie muttered confused. "What the hell are you talking about?! He wasn't a meathead like you! He was skinny! He just made copies of himself somehow!"

Blaine was suddenly outraged, much to Burnie's relief as he was finally acting like a normal person would. Sort of. "A true agent of Broki! Not even lifting the animals himself?! Does he not realise the sweet gains he could be making?!" The bodybuilding farmer headed towards the mantlepiece and retrieved his prized possession: his old Hunting shotmace, Earthshaper.

"It's faunus season."

"God, I hate your shitty one-liners."

-(-)-

After fetching Brandon who had remained blissfully unaware of everything up to this point, the three farmers began their search for the thieving faunus. They searched through each of their lands, through their barns and chicken coops, up and down both sides of the valley and back again.

It was Burnie who found their prey first. Carrying a pig and heading up the hill to the innermost of the outer walls, the blond fox faunus was slow and easily caught. A shotgun blast shredded the pig in his arms but the blond himself vanished in a puff of smoke. "Dammit!" Burnie yelled. "He must be around here somewhere! He was running back to his hovel! Brandon, start digging."

"Where? Look around! Their hideout could be anywhere!" Brandon whined.

"I have a solution." Blaine interjected, raising his shotmace.

Earthshaper was a brilliantly simple weapon on the face of it. Technically speaking it was the shape and size of a two-handed mace but its wielder could swing it comfortably with one. Made entirely of high-carbon steel, the shaft was thick and inlaid with designs of doves in white gold. The shaft was capable of being reconfigured into a traditional shotgun shape for easy wielding when a ranged weapon is more appropriate. The head of the mace was spherical save for the four flanges equidistant from each other and the hole at the top that served as the barrel. The handle was wrapped in leather for a more comfortable grip, interrupted only by the trigger for the shotgun mode.

Opening the shotmace's chamber, Blaine retrieved the dust rounds loaded inside and replaced them with a dust crystal of an earthy brown colour that he carved himself to fit. With a swing of his arm, he closed Earthshaper with one hand.

"And so this disgraceful cardio comes to an end." Blaine breathed as he slammed the head of Earthshaper perpendicular to the hill, burying it by sheer strength a foot into the soil. "And I can find those misguided faunus and show them the true glory of sweet gains!" Pressing down on the shaft, he aimed the barrel of the shotmace directly away from the group of farmers. Pulling back his right hand, he whispered "Brodin be praised".

And thrust forward.

As his palm impacted the handle end of the Earthshaper, the section of hill in front of the farmers appeared to vanish as a wave of sound and pressure hit them all at once. Blaine was unaffected. Brandon and Burnie, civilian through and through, were not. Both farmers were knocked off their feet, Brandon rolling down the hill before coming to a stop.

Blaine looked over his handiwork. The Earthshaper was quite well named. It did not destroy anything. Just reshaped it to its wielder's will. The effect of the Earthshaper when used with an earth dust crystal is to compress the materials in the direction the barrel is pointing, increasing the density of the surrounding area to make room for a big open space. Looking into the hollow he had created Blaine spotted something strange. Small black shapes with flecks of white... dissolving into ash.

Burnie grumbled to himself as he returned to his feet. "What the fu-", his tirade was ended before it could begin as Blaine grabbed him by the shirt.

"Go home. _Now_."

Burnie wasn't exactly the type to listen to orders. "Like fuck I'm goin' home until-", once again, he was stopped as Blaine let go of his shirt to grab his face and pointed it in the direction of the hole.

Where more shapes were appearing. Shapes with white masks and hateful red eyes. The blood visibly drained from Burnie's face. Blaine turned Burnie to face the muscular retired huntsman again.

"Go get Brandon. Go together to your house. Barricade as well as you can and keep your shotgun on hand. Got it?" Blaine half asked, half ordered.

Burnie nodded as Blaine let go of him and was off like a shot, picking Brandon up by the arm and _running_.

Blaine meanwhile, was pulling out and opening his scroll as quickly as he could. Pulling up the emergency contact feed, he input his old authorisation code and sent the message of a code Black with his coordinates. By the time he had retrieved Earthshaper and reloaded it with regular dust rounds, the alarms were already sounding.

More and more shapes were appearing in the crater. They were easy to identify. Mohlerts. Mole-like Grimm. Almost always small in stature, they were phenomenal diggers and had been the creatures most often responsible for sabotaging human fortifications during Grimm incursions. Each paw had a half dozen shovel-like claws giving them the ability to practically swim through dirt. They were actually Blaine's specialty. He was most often used as a sapper. Capable of reshaping an area, he could crush mohlert and their tunnels with a single blast of Earthshaper in his heyday. That might even be what he had done here purely by accident. It wouldn't surprise him if the mohlert were there to create an incursion point for larger Grimm.

"It's been a long time since I had a good round of Whack-a-Mohlert..."

Unseen by both man and Grimm, a blond faunus disappeared into smoke.

-(-)-

"Mohlerts." Naruto gasped as his doppelganger's memories flowed into him. "Out. Everyone out, now!" he shouted at the gathering faunus.

"What's happening?" a female dog faunus asked as she held her children close.

"We need to leave. It's not safe in here anymore." he half-explained as he started guiding people to the exit. "Get outside and get to high ground as fast as you can and keep moving away from the outer walls."

-(-)-

"This is stupid. This is stupid. This is stupid!" Naruto chanted to himself as he headed towards the outer wall.

He had left a few doppelgangers to watch over the other faunus but he knew they would be relatively safe. If it was mohlerts, they were probably the only ones there. And if they were that many under the wall, that meant they hadn't gotten any further. Probably. Likely enough that he felt he had to do something to help at the wall. This was protecting his family too.

-(-)-

"Hahahaha!" Blaine laughed maniacally as he slammed his ridiculously heavy mace into anything that caught his eye. Sometimes it was a mohlert that had come up to attack him. More often it was a crack in the super-compact earth from one of the other times he had struck it, creating more of them. "You mohlerts are fools! Following the way of Broki with your constant dirt swimming cardio! You seek embrace within his lean, athletic bosom! BUT NOT EVEN HE SHALL ACCEPT GRIMM WITHIN HIS TREADMILL-FILLED DOMAIN!"

Really, he was having the time of his life. Which may explain how he missed the mohlert that had appeared directly behind him, ready to rip out his spine.

"Not on my watch, dirt-mouse!" a scratchy voice shouted. Blaine turned, mace raised to strike but to his surprise he found himself looking down at a mohlert getting its head crushed between two identical dropkicking faunus. Upon hitting the ground, both blond fox men burst into smoke.

Properly looking around himself for the first time since his battle started, Blaine saw something he never would have expected. Two dozen copies of the fox faunus they had been hunting were surrounding him.

And helping to fight back the Grimm.

"Temporary truce?" one of them asked, Blaine unable to tell whether it was the original or not. "You can go back to trying to kill me after we deal with this."

Blaine shook his head. He had no intention of killing the faunus. But he could explain that later. For now, there was a pest problem to deal with..

-(-)-

Mohlert (prounounced 'mole-ert'): Mole variety of Grimm. Digging near their habitats is a bad idea. Small but swarms easily. Named for the author Lois Ehlert who wrote a picture book based on a Seneca legend about a mole who refused to yield a molehill to a fox.

Naruto Fox: Obviously based on two different stories. One being the popular manga series Naruto (that just recently finished its 15 year run). The other the Roald Dahl book 'The Fantastic Mr. Fox'.

Burnie, Brandon and Blaine: Very, _very_ loosely based on the Rooster Teeth employees Burnie Burns, Brandon Farmahini (not really, I just used his name because it started with B) and Blaine Gibson (again, not really. The B thing again and I needed a name I could rhyme with a character trait. I don't know if Blaine is in fact particularly vain).

Blaine: Based loosely on Saint David, the patron saint of Wales. A deeply religious man (snicker) whose most notable miracle was to raise the land up to form a small hill. Just to make it absolutely clear, David is Blaine's LAST name, not his first. Also, his speech pattern is based on the SwoleAcceptance subreddit. Go read it. Hilarious and kind of inspiring.

-(-)-

A/N: Oh, god I had fun with writing this. I love RWBY as a series and I had the concept for Naruto's greater backstory in my head for months. Soon as I started writing it we got a lot of the best stuff in this chapter. I freaking love Blaine in this. Hell, I'm tempted to do a side-story with him as the protagonist. He's that fun to write.

So I have no idea how often I'll update this. Those who read my other stories know that pretty well.

Thanks for reading.


	2. Chapter 2

"The Doppelgänger semblance? You're certain?", Proffessor Ozpin, Headmaster of the prestigious combat school Beacon Academy and highly respected figure in almost every circle you could ask.

"So it seems. Reports from first response and footage captured from the AK-130s all say the same thing." the voice from Ozpin's scroll answered. "A dozen duplicates all identical, all acting independently of each other. It's the Doppelgänger, alright."

"Astounding.", Ozpin said before taking a sip of his ever present coffee. "The last time that semblance appeared was-"

"Kushina, the Red Death, I remember." the voice finished.

"Any resemblance? Semblances are semi-hereditary, after all."

There was a pause. "He's a _faunus_, Oz." the voice stated flatly.

"Well I suppose I'm just so enlightened I don't see such differences anymore." Oz said chidingly.

"Don't give me that, Ozpin! You know I've been trying to-"

Ozpin's laugh interrupted him. "Relax, James! I was just messing with you."

General James Ironwood could be heard grumbling on the other end of the scroll call but he let the jibe slide with a sigh. "That does bring up a... problem, though.", Ironwood admitted. "Jacques is making a lot of noise over this. He's making it sound as though the boy conspired with the Grimm to weaken the kingdom while at the same time playing the part of magnanimous redeemer by offering to employ the other faunus as a sort of 'community service'."

"Oh dear." Ozpin sighed. "And I assume he wants the boy imprisoned or executed to get rid of any obstacles. James, that semblance is too valuable to lose to the machinations of a greedy fool like Schnee."

"The SDC does a lot of good for the kingdoms, Oz.", Ironwood defended weakly. "But you're right. Thing is, there's not much I can do about it. I'd conscript him to the Hunter Corps but they're still leery of faunus here as it is and with this hanging over him..."

"They would never accept a faunus with a criminal record." Ozpin agreed. "Do you have a plan?"

"I'm talking to him.", Ironwood said, smirk audible in his voice.

"Very funny." Ozpin said with a roll of his eyes.

"I'm serious, Oz. I've got nothing. I'm asking for your help."

Ozpin took another lengthy swig of his coffee as plan after plan was crafted and discarded before he settled on the best one. Even it wasn't spectacular but it was the best he had. "I'll be in Atlas in a few hours."

"Shall I roll out the red carpet?", Ironwood joked.

"How did that work out for you the last time I visited?" Ozpin asked with amusement.

"You snuck in through the back and got one of my men demoted." the General answered flatly.

"Guards aren't supposed to just let people in to secure facilities, James. Even if they do say 'Don't worry, I'm supposed to be here.'"

"You _were_ supposed to be there!" Ironwood fumed.

"Details, details."

-(-)-

"Ozpin! It's been too long, it's good to see you! Come in, come in!" Jacques Schnee greeted warmly with the pleasantness learned from a lifetime of business dealings. On the inside he was on edge. Ozpin never made social calls. Not to him, at least. It was no secret that the two clashed due to their... differing ideologies. "Hannah, bring some coffee, would you? Black, one sugar."

Ozpin entered the luxurious office fully, examining it in detail. Almost nothing had changed since he had been there last. Same glass desk decorated with the Schnee Dust Corporation logo: a white snowflake, same potted ferns in the back corners. "It's good to see you too, Jacques. How's the family?"

"Ah, Winter is continuing her little rebellious phase. Unfortunately it seems Weiss wishes to follow in her footsteps. Whitley is making excellent progress with his studies, at least." Schnee said with the fatherly pride he might show at a new product unveiling.

"It's truly a joy to see one's children come into their own, isn't it?" Ozpin asked rhetorically, masterfully hiding his distaste as Jacques' secretary gave him his coffee. "Thank you." he said to her as he took a sip.

"And how are you, Ozpin?" Schnee asked, trying to get past the polite chat to Ozpin's real reason for stopping by. "I know you like to go beyond the norm for recruiting students but I imagine you're a little far afield for that!", he said, laughing at his own joke.

"Actually, that is precisely my purpose here. I wished to speak to you about a young man by the name of Naruto."

Schnee's face tightened once again much more noticeably, his thick moustache strengthening the pronouncement of his frown. "I see. Standards must have dropped sharply at Beacon if you are looking to recruit Grimm sympathisers, Ozpin."

"Please remember who you are speaking to Mr. Schnee.", Ozpin requested, façade of politeness fading quickly. "Do you really expect me to swallow that? I've read the reports. That young man helped fight back a fledgeling Grimm incursion at great personal cost. It's what got him caught after all."

"Two men _died_ in that incursion and he was the direct cause, Ozpin!" Schnee countered, rising from his chair and raising his voice.

"On the contrary. The ex-huntsman he fought alongside reports the mohlerts had already made it past the five walls surrounding Atlas and in his _expert_ opinion," Ozpin stressed, "were very close to creating a much more significant incursion point. One that would allow in far more than just mohlerts. Your scaremongering might work on the populace, it might even work on some of the higher-ups here in Atlas, but rest assured, it does not work on me."

Schnee gritted his teeth. This was why he disliked Ozpin. Schnee was a captain of industry, a vital part of the kingdom of Atlas and this damnable man would still speak to him as though he were a petulant child. "The boy is still a criminal. He stole tens of thousands of lien worth of food from the mouths of Atlas citizens."

"And again you speak in such doomsaying terms." Ozpin responded, openly rolling his eyes. "Not 'from the mouths of Atlas citizens', Mr. Schnee. From the farms of some very well-off farmers. Not a single person went hungry in Atlas because of Naruto's actions. Had the farmers agreed to trade or to employ some of them, this would not have happened."

"So that lying faunus would have people believe-" Schnee began.

Ozpin cut him off. "_Enough_, Mr. Schnee. We both know why you want the boy out of the way. It can remain unsaid if it will mean you drop this pretense."

Schnee drummed his fingers on his desk. Once, twice, before slowly returning to his seat. "Very well. What is your alternative?" 'And how does it benefit me' remained unsaid.

"Pragmatism." Ozpin answered with the slightest of smirks.

"Pragmatism." Schnee echoed, scoffing.

"Indeed. Tell me something, Mr. Schnee. How many of your board members have you lost to the White Fang?"

"Are you threatening-" Jacques began before once again being cut off.

"No, no, far from it." Ozpin placated. "In truth I'm looking out for your family's safety. Let me put this in the White Fang's perspective for you. A faunus who did whatever it took to take care of his fellow faunus risks his life and his freedom in order to fight against a Grimm incursion. In response, the Schnee Dust Company rallies for the boy to be executed for his feeding the hungry. Now let's say your bid is successful. Naruto is executed for his crime and you magnanimously offer his friends gainful employment at one of your many mining facilities. And of course it isn't hard to believe that the White Fang might once again mistake your 'generosity' for slavery. Jacques, your plan will make the boy a martyr."

"Now who is doomsaying." Jacques scoffed.

"Remind me, Jacques. What was their response to your last 'recruitment drive'?" Ozpin asked pointedly, taking a swig of his coffee.

That... was a very good point, Schnee had to admit. Two board members were abducted in the wake of the announcement, the White Fang threatening to kill them if the SDC didn't halt their plans. SDC policy is to not capitulate to terrorists so they continued doing as they intended and... the White Fang responded in kind. That was a bad day, to put it far too lightly. Ozpin was right. Schnee might not surrender to terrorists but this would incite them far too much. "You still haven't suggested your alternative."

"Exile them." Ozpin suggested.

"Exile them?" Schnee echoed, incredulous. "What, all of them? Why?"

"Because that is the option I'm giving you." Ozpin said, calmly sipping his coffee. "You must admit, Jacques, you have boxed yourself into a corner. You have spent so much effort on painting the boy as a villain the public will not settle for light punishments. Imprisonment, execution, even exile will martyr him to varying degrees. In fact, imprisonment or exile might see him into the arms of the White Fang and then they have a vendetta against you _specifically_, don't they?"

"I could just exile him alone. You would recruit him, and I would employ the other faunus. Everybody wins." Schnee countered.

"I would recruit him in this scenario, would I?" Ozpin asked with raised eyebrows. "Are you really quite certain of that?"

Schnee gave him a flat look. "You wouldn't leave someone to die just to spite me, Ozpin."

"No? I assure you I've done far worse in my career." Ozpin retorted truthfully. "He wouldn't die anyway. The White Fang would scour the globe to find him, I'm certain. A symbol of their oppression like him? And with his power to boot? Absolutely. Besides, if this entire incident has taught me anything it's that faunus oppression is still alive and well in Atlas and fighting against it is a worthy cause."

"How _dare_ you-!"

"Those are your options, Mr. Schnee. Either you can move for Naruto and the other faunus to be exiled to Vale or paint a bigger target on your back. I hope you make the correct decision." Standing up, Ozpin calmly left the office. The sound of something smashing following him as he shut the door. As he passed the secretary's desk he once again thanked her for the coffee and suggested she send for a janitor to clean the mess in the CEO's office. And perhaps order a replacement desk.

-(-)-

It took several days. Several days of meetings, scroll calls and many, _many_ assurances to both the Vale and Atlas councils from both Ozpin and Ironwood that this was the proper course of action. Add in the admittedly reluctant endorsement from Jacques Schnee and Ozpin was able to meet Naruto personally for the first time to tell him the good news.

"So who're you? Someone else to accuse me of workin' with Grimm? Don't bother, I'm not in the mood."

He was not greeted warmly.

"Do you know who I am?" Ozpin asked.

Naruto squinted at him. "Noooo, that's why I asked, 'who're you?'"

Ozpin conceded the point. He just loved his intro to the specially recruited students too much to forego the formalities. "Well, I should introduce myself then. I admit it has been a while. My name is Professor Ozpin, the headmaster of Beacon Academy, the premier combat school within the kingdom of Vale."

"That's a long name." Naruto quipped.

Ozpin smiled. "Indeed. And you would be Naruto... Do you have a last name?"

"Nope. Orphan." Naruto answered as though tired of hearing the question.

"Well, that won't do." Ozpin complained. It really wouldn't. Putting that on his transcripts would mess up the organisation of the system. Would they count that as his last name or first name for alphabetising purposes? Not to mention it severely limited the possibility for word acronym team names! "It might be a bit on the nose but might I suggest 'Fox'?"

Naruto shrugged. He considered himself to be 'Naruto the fox' anyway so it wasn't a big change. "That's fine."

"Excellent!" Ozpin smiled again. One problem solved! "Now Mr. Fox, if you would indulge me, I'd like to ask you a few questions."

Naruto sighed wearily. "I. Didn't. Work. With. The. Grimm. Why do people keep askin' me that! I didn't even know they were there! How the hell're you supposed to work with 'em anyway?!" he asked, near shouting.

"Please calm down. I know you didn't work with the Grimm and I know the whole story with the farmers. I just want to ask about your aura abilities and your semblance." Ozpin assured him. "Now, if I may ask, who unlocked your aura for you?"

Naruto stared blankly at him. "My what now?"

Ozpin's brow furrowed. "Your aura. Makes you stronger, tougher, faster, glows a little sometimes?"

"OH, that!", Naruto exclaimed, understanding dawning on his face. "Yeah, I dunno. It was always just a thing I could do. No one else could but I guess I'm just awesome." he finished his 'explanation', grinning.

"Quite." Ozpin agreed. "Were you always able to use your semblance also?" At Naruto's blank look he elaborated. "Your doppelgängers." The look remained. "Duplicates." Still. "Clones."

"OH! Yeah, I couldn't always do that. When I was a little kid I was having... y'know... some rough times. Anyways, we were outnumbered and I was like, 'I wish there was more of me' and then there was!"

"Were." Ozpin corrected.

"Right, were, whatever." Naruto waved it off. "So why d'ya wanna know?"

"Unlocking aura and semblances are things usually done at combat schools. They are among our greatest tools in fighting the creatures of Grimm." Ozpin explained. "Usually, aura is unlocked by one person unlocking it for another. Sometimes it happens in a time of great need but such things are rare. To be honest, I have never heard of it happening so young that the person doesn't even remember _not_ having it. Until today, that is."

"So... You're saying... I really _am_ just awesome? Sweet!" Naruto exclaimed.

"I suppose that's one way of looking at it." Ozpin half-agreed. "I suppose that's enough sating my curiosity. Thank you for that. Now, I suppose I'm overdue for giving you some good news."

"Are my family okay?!" Naruto asked urgently.

"They're fine and will continue to be fine. You have all been sentenced to exile for your crime-"

"WHAT?!" Naruto yelled, interrupting the professor. "How are we gonna be fine?! They're kicking us out into the wilderness! I can't keep 'em safe out there!"

"Please, calm down and let me finish." Ozpin requested calmly.

"But-!"

"Let me finish." Ozpin insisted, but decided to keep talking to stop him from interrupting again. Faster that way. "You are all being exiled: to Vale. It has been arranged that your... family will be employed as farmhands within Vale territory. It isn't especially well paying work but it will put food on the table."

"You..." Naruto started but stopped trying to understand what was happening. "Like with Schnee?" he hazarded.

"No. Not like Schnee. They will be paid in lien, real money to spend as they like."

"I-I... I don't understand." Naruto struggled to say, eyes welling up. "What's the catch. There's gotta be a catch, y'know!"

"No catch." Ozpin affirmed.

"That's..." Naruto gasped, wiping at his eyes, before his expression hardened, tears running down his face despite his best efforts. "You're lying. That's not how it works. There's _ALWAYS_ a catch! We'd _bow_ and _scrape_ and _beg_ and they'd offer us help if we do _one little thing_. And they'd take some of us away with them. Sometimes they came back with food or money but they _always_ came back bloody and bruised!" Naruto sniffed before slamming his fists on the table. "So don't you lie to my face and say there's no _fucking _catch! That ain't how the world works for us!"

"Mr. Fox!" Ozpin said sternly.

Naruto looked up at him.

"Naruto." Ozpin said as his expression softened. "Would you like to see them?"

Naruto's eyes widened, tears still running down his whiskered cheeks before his expression hardened. He nodded.

-(-)-

A/N: Aww, come on! I put a freakin' humour tag on this fic! How do I do this every time?! Whenever I write something I manage to make it super depressing!

Update 12/31/16: Changed pseudo OC to the canon Jacques Schnee. It... did not take much alteration.


	3. Chapter 3

George Gerontio was a man of noble bearing. Delicate facial features marred only by the small scar to the left of his left eye. His clothing was covered from view by the regal (and undeniably antiquated) armour he wore coloured in blue and gold and adorned with lion motifs surrounded by gold filigree. He carried two weapons. A segmented spear and a sword that appeared to only be ceremonial. The shape of the guard obstructing a good third of the blade's edge. Like most hunters, George Gerontio stood out in any crowd.

There was no crowd, however. All he saw was an old friend lamenting what he saw as another failure.

"Mighty Brodin, I pray. Spot me in my time of need. As I benchpress my burdens of guilt in sets of five by five. I pray. Give me strength to lift them and hold them high."

"Blaine?"

"I pray. Give me strength not to falter under the weight of my failures."

"Blaine."

"I pray. Though they may not believe. Though they may not trust in your mighty swole, watch over these two as they pass into the next life. Wheymen."

As George moved to place a hand on the larger man's shoulder, he was – as was often the case – surprised by the larger man's speed and reflexes. His outstretched arm was grabbed, turned, and grappled into a position where it would be easily broken.

Their team all had very specific strengths. Andrea was an expert of tactics and strategy, Patrick had been a master of his own aura, George himself could wield any weapon with uncanny ability.

And Blaine? Blaine could beat anything into submission with his bare hands.

"George." Blaine said as he disinterestedly released the trapped arm.

"Andrea was surprised to see your authorisation being used. We thought you might have..." George trailed off, trying to find the right words. "We hadn't heard from you since-"

"Since Patrick." Blaine cut in.

"... Yes." George answered solemnly. The fact that the last time they had seen each other had also been at a friend's grave was not lost on either of them. "... Were they good men?", he asked, unable to stop himself.

Blaine scoffed at the tactless question that told you exactly where the other man's priorities were. If you weren't a 'good man' then as far as George was concerned you weren't worth mourning. "By your estimation? Hardly. Burnie was angry at worst, irritated at best. Brandon was skittish and utterly unable to stand on his own. They were no saints but they didn't deserve this."

"No one deserves this." George said in an attempt at being conciliatory.

"Then why can't I ever stop it!" Blaine shouted, rounding on him. "First that outpost, then what happened with Patrick-"

"Patrick wasn't your fault! I gave the order-"

"And I _followed_ it! I should have stayed and fought with him!" Blaine growled.

"An _army_ of hunters couldn't have saved him from that! What good would have been done from you dying alongside him?!" George asked incredulously.

Blaine deflated as he turned his back on his old teammate. "At least he wouldn't have died alone. At least I could have saved him from... _that_. What good was done by my _surviving_?" he asked in a hollow tone.

"Nothing." Blaine looked at him again, shock and hurt plain to see in his eyes but George continued anyway. "What? Were you not expecting an honest answer? He saved your life but what is that worth when you spent the rest of it hiding in a field spouting nonsense? His sacrifice was pointless because _you_ made it so." And with that, George the Seathslayer turned his back on his lost teammate for the final time, not even bothering to look as Blaine collapsed to the ground, as a quiet scream of self-loathing and loss tore from this throat.

As George neared the exit from the graveyard, and mounted his white Steed S50 motorcycle, a grey-haired man stepped out from the shade of the gates carrying a coffee cup, long empty but it was habit at this point.

"He will be more open to your offer now." George told him, bitterness seeping into his voice.

"It may not seem like it now but it was a good thing you just did. Both for your friend and for this world.", the man tried to comfort him.

"If it is all the same, Mr. Ozpin. I just found one of my few living friends after he had been missing for years. And within minutes of seeing him again I tore his soul to pieces and pissed on it. Please don't try to tell me that was the right thing to do. I doubt I could stomach it."

-(-)-

Naruto was still struck by the view out of the airship even as his journey came to an end. No matter how far they went there was always more world beyond the horizon. It made him eager to explore it but at the same time terrified that it was filled with things that wanted to kill him.

Oh, and the Grimm. They were scary too, he supposed.

It had been several days since his fateful meeting with Ozpin and the older man had finally made good on his promise for Naruto to meet his family at their new residence/workplace. The trip, wasn't so much a trip, however, as it was his official exile. They even had a very official gathering where officious officials watched him get officially thrown out of the kingdom by a couple of AK-130s. Of course the impact of this moment was somewhat ruined by an airship immediately picking him up and his giving a jaunty wave as it flew off.

Oh well. He was gone and that was what mattered as far as both sides were concerned.

As the airship touched down, Naruto leapt out of it eagerly, unable to wait to see his family again. He needn't have been in such a rush. Many of them had come to greet him.

"Naruto!"

"Boss!"

"It's good to see you again, Leader!"

Tears welled up in Naruto's eyes at seeing the beaming smiles on the faces of his most precious people. For so long they had had to struggle to survive. Now they were free. Healthy. Happy. Safe. Everything he had ever wanted for them had been achieved.

"_I'm so happy to see you all again!_"

-(-)-

"How are you holding up, young man?" Ozpin asked.

It was late at night. They were sat in the living room of the farmhouse where the faunus now lived and worked. The owners and workers had all turned in early to prepare for the early rise typical of farm work. Naruto was holding tight onto a cup of tea. It was by no means his preference but it didn't seem like he even knew it was a drink he was holding. His mind was running in circles.

"The owners seem nice." Naruto said finally. "Usually I'm a pretty good judge. Ya see enough fakers you learn to spot the tells, ya know? They seem nice. Genuine."

"This place is nice, too." He continued. Staring blankly at a non-specific spot on the coffee table. "Everybody gets their own space. Lotsa room out back for the kids to play in. Kaine told me they found a pond a little ways away and they tried skipping stones across it. She says they're gonna ask if it's okay to swim there." He let out a weak laugh.

"Ya know, I made a promise a while back. When they put me in charge I swore to myself I'd do whatever it took to keep 'em safe. I'd give up anything to see them live happy lives and now," His voice hitched, "now it looks like they can be. And I'm _so_ happy about that. I'm so glad that I can't stand it! But... They don't need me anymore. I put everything I had into making their lives better and now they don't need it."

"What the hell do I do now?"

Ozpin calmly sipped his coffee. By arranging this escape for his family, the headmaster had bestowed Naruto with a mixed blessing. Every child growing up comes up with an impossible dream they wish to achieve. They see something amazing and say "Wow. I wish I could do that." Most see those dreams for the fantasies that they are and abandon them as they near adolescence or adulthood. Others, those with implacable willpower and determination decide 'impossible' isn't a word. They work, they plan, they fight to achieve the unachievable. And naturally, most of those fail too.

Ozpin was beginning to believe he fell in the second category.

Then there are the rare few. The rare lucky unlucky few who through grit, brains, luck or most often all of the above manage to obtain a miracle. Their dream comes true. And then, after the elation and accolades start to fade away, the same question inevitably reaches all of them. 'What do I do now?' So much time and effort dedicated to one thing, once it's done they realise they have nothing else. Sacrificed it all for the sake of their dream.

Naruto was no different in that regard. He had his people, yes. Even to the point where he called them his family. But even so, and as so often happens with community leaders, he had to maintain a certain distance from them. Being overly close to some of them could lead him to putting their needs over the rest. Even the appearance of doing so could sow dissent. Dissent could lead to division. Division to discovery by their oppressors. And in their former home, that could lead to an unfortunate end for all of them. Ozpin idly wondered if the young man in front of him knew that instinctively... or found out the hard way.

In any case, Naruto could stay with them now if he so chose. He could lead a simple life as a farmhand. Maybe see if he could reforge the bonds with his family on equal terms. But the young man had already tossed aside that possibility or he wouldn't be asking that one question. Fear of them rejecting him? Perhaps. Perhaps he still wanted to achieve the impossible but had no such goal in front of him.

"Well, if you're taking suggestions, Mr Fox. I might have one." Ozpin finally said.

"Right." Naruto smirked. "Here it is. Took ya so long I was starting to think there really wasn't a catch."

"There really isn't." Ozpin reconfirmed. "No catch. Your family are safe and if you wish to stay with them and work here, you can do so. I'm sure the owner wouldn't mind an extra pair of hands. But if you were going to do that... I dare say you _would_ be doing that."

Naruto didn't respond. Just stared, waiting for the other shoe to drop.

"Mr Fox." Ozpin began, leaning forward in his armchair. "What do you know of huntsmen?"

Naruto shrugged, folding his arms as he leaned back in his own seat. "They fight Grimm." he answered simply.

"True." the headmaster smirked, accepting the... succinct answer. "Huntsmen and huntresses fight against the Grimm to protect the four kingdoms and all people within them. They do this using the best tools available. Advanced, specially crafted weaponry and clothing, but most importantly they use the greatest asset humanity have in this endless conflict. Aura."

"Is that the thing you called the clone thing I do?" Naruto asked.

"Not quite. Aura is not a well understood concept. It hinges a great deal on the metaphysical elements of the soul and-" It was at this point Ozpin noticed the faunus' vacant expression. "In simple terms, aura is the use of the power of the soul to affect the body. It can make you stronger, faster, more durable."

"Right." Naruto nodded. "The thing that makes me awesome. Got it."

"Y... Yes." Ozpin agreed reluctantly. "Usually someone has to unlock another's aura for them and it can be an... unpleasant experience." Left unsaid was that it maimed or killed some people. "And through training in its use, one can learn to expand the capabilities of their aura. This is what we call 'semblance'."

"Ah!" Naruto exclaimed, pointing at the older man. "_That_ was the clone thingy!"

"Indeed. Your semblance has been dubbed 'Doppelgänger' in the past. An old word for a look-alike or double of a person. As semblances go, it is in fact one of the most versatile on record. I believe you can figure out where I'm going with this."

Naruto dropped his arms from his chest and let them rest perpendicular to his body. "You want me to be a huntsman."

"I do." Ozpin confirmed, not hiding his intent in the slightest. "Your semblance alone could do so much to beat back the Grimm, could save so many lives. Your talent with aura without any training whatsoever-" Ozpin stopped as he saw the deepening frown on Naruto's face.

He had believed that with his regular self-aggrandisement the young faunus would be rather vulnerable to flattery. Not so, evidently so he tried a different tack. "I also have an impossible dream, you know." He began, standing and starting to pace. Lacing a bit of honesty into his appeal might help. "I have a dream that one day, people of Vale, of all the four kingdoms can live their lives without fear of the Grimm. I want to see a world where Atlas doesn't need five defensive walls to act as a glorified early warning system. A world where Vale can build a city without it immediately being overrun by soulless monsters. Where I don't have to welcome children to my school, watch them grow into fine young men and women and years later learn they died fighting for some pointless objective that we later lost anyway. That world... That is my dream. And as the years march on I can't help but notice how impossible it is. Even so, that's no excuse to stop. I might not see it in my lifetime. But I like to believe that as long as someone keeps that insane dream alive, it will happen one day."

Ozpin stopped pacing to look at Naruto directly, "You kept wondering what the catch was. There still isn't one, but I propose a trade. I helped you achieve your impossible dream. Will you help me with mine?"

-(-)-

A/N: Literally every time. No happy chapters. The humour tag option should just be taken out of my options, I swear.

Long wait on this one. I know. It's how I roll. Hate me for it, I won't blame you.

So pretty obvious who Blaine's team are based on. The patron saints of England, Wales, Scotland and Ireland. Yes, I made Saint George the leader but I also made him kind of a dick, so I think it balances out. Though... Maybe people might be more miffed that I genderswapped Saint Andrew. Meh.

Thanks for reading.


	4. Chapter 4

"I have to go to school?" Naruto asked, horror plain to see in his expression at the very idea.

"Indeed." Ozpin answered.

The two were walking through the streets of Vale, Naruto following the Headmaster obediently mostly owing to having _no idea_ what to do in an entirely new locale. Old habits kicked in for the fox faunus trained out of necessity. Constantly watching his surroundings for the figurative (and once actual) knife in the dark. Observing the people they passed to gauge their motives. Some didn't care, some tried very hard to _look_ like they didn't care, the rest either frightened or glaring. Overall, way better than Atlas in his opinion.

"While I have allowed students into Beacon a year or two early on occasion" Ozpin continued, "I believe that would be unwise in your case. Your skills with your aura and semblance are better than some new entrants into my school but the rest of your skills..." The pause seemed to drag on.

"Are even better!" Naruto finished, nodding with an expression of certainty on his face.

"... Not so much." Ozpin denied, a rueful smile on his face. "Besides, even beyond the realm of combat there is far more to being a huntsman. Huntsmen and huntresses as much as they are warriors and protectors, they must also be symbols of security for the people. A huntsman must seem in control of everything around them at all times. For example, being aware of your surroundings is good. Doing so obviously makes you look paranoid and worried. Which makes the people paranoid and worried. I don't need to tell you why that would be bad."

Naruto grimaced, and tried to stop looking around. He lasted a few seconds before twisting around to see something in his periphery. Seeing that it would be more difficult than he thought, he settled for trying to be less obvious.

Ozpin smiled slightly at the attempt. Learning such control over oneself was more something learned at Beacon than Signal but it served well as an example of how much Naruto still had to learn. "I've made arrangements so that you can skip much of the standard curriculum but at the very least you will be designing your own weapon, learning to properly maintain it and learning to wield it. You will also be designing your combat outfit."

"Don't know much about weapons." Naruto admitted.

Ozpin nodded. "Hence why you will be spending a year at Signal. Having your own is a requirement to join Beacon."

Naruto frowned, still not liking the idea but coming around to the necessity. "Fine. So is that where we're going now?"

"Not quite." Ozpin admitted. "Unfortunately the new term doesn't start for another month. Not to worry, though. I've made arrangements for you to stay at an apartment in the city in the meantime."

Quiet, as though in the distance, an ominous voice carried over to the two.

**"Amaaaa-zing gaiiiiinz... how sweeeeeet the liiiifts..."**

"With appropriate supervision, of course."

"**That greeew a bro... like meeeeeee!"**

Naruto looked at the headmaster oddly. "So I'm gonna stay with some random stranger for a month?"

"**I once wa-as weak... but nooow am swole..."**

"Well," Ozpin started as they approached the front door of an apartment complex, "not really a _random_ stranger."

"**Was skinny bu-ut now..."**

Ozpin raised his hand to press the buzzer for Naruto's future apartment but got the feeling it was unnecessary. Where he got that idea...

"**A-AM HUGE!"**

… One may never know.

Standing before them, having thrown open the door, near ripping it off its hinges, was Blaine David. Former huntsman and... bass singer, apparently.

"Fox boy!" Blaine exclaimed on seeing Naruto again. "It's been too long!"

Naruto shot Ozpin a look that questioned the man's sanity before looking back to Blaine. Then shot Ozpin the same look again with _emphasis, _ears twitching in irritation before looking up at the disturbingly muscular man. "It really hasn't."

"Don't be like that, Fox boy! Now come, I welcome you to the mighty iron temple I call my abode! For all those seeking the greatness of swole, mighty Brodin shall accept them with open, muscular, _rippling_ arms!" Blaine 'reassured', heading inside expecting Naruto to follow him.

He didn't. Instead, he turned to look at Ozpin again, very confused. "So... Is _he_ Brodin or...?"

"I..." Ozpin started but thought better of it. "Will see you in a year. Good luck, Mr Fox." He said before walking towards the nearest metro.

Naruto watched him leave before sagging in defeat and trudging into the small house.

-(-)-

"Alright, class. We have a new student joining us this year." The teacher droned uninterested. "Please introduce yourself." She told Naruto.

Naruto stood awkwardly at the front of the class, scratching the back of his head. "Uh, hi. I'm Naruto Fox." He could see the dirty looks he was getting from a couple of people. That was the worst he got but none of the looks were particularly friendly.

Then some kid with a mohawk basically set the tone for the year. "What's with the scratching? You got fleas or something?" Most of the class erupted in laughter.

Naruto sighed. This was going to be a long year.

-(-)-

The hunter track at Signal had the students spending a lot of time in one particular room. The combat training hall. A small arena for sparring, a firing range, some training dummies for melee practice, everything students would need to hone their skills with their own weapons and abilities.

"So you're the kid Oz has his eye on, huh?" The laid-back combat teacher asked Naruto rhetorically.

It wasn't a class that was occurring. Naruto was visiting the combat instructor after hours as part of his 'fast-track' huntsman program.

Naruto mentally decided the teacher reminded him of Old Grey, one of the older faunus in his little community that spent most of his time drunk off his ass. It might have been the dishevelled appearance and constant slur that drew the comparison. "I guess." he answered.

"Well, if there's one thing about him I can't deny, it's that he has an eye for talent." Qrow Branwen smirked at his subtle ego trip. "So. You can fight a little. You have aura and your semblance. What you _don't _have is your gear. Combat clothing and a weapon."

"Yeah, I figured that out." Naruto agreed. Everyone else on the hunter track had a special outfit they would wear in combat class. The weapons were the real problem. Without one Naruto had real trouble. His opponents just had more options than he did. He would win occasionally but only by abusing the hell out of his semblance. Unfortunately people figured out the tricks to it quickly and he stopped winning after that.

"Heh, yeah. You're at a real disadvantage until we get this solved so we're rushing things a bit. Any thoughts on your weapon?"

Naruto shrugged helplessly. "I dunno. I mean I've never really trained with any weapons."

"Yeah." Qrow shrugged. "That's a problem. We could prob'ly set you up with something for you to train with until we get you your own but... Maybe we should stick with something a little closer to the skills you already have."

"Like what?"

Qrow scratched at his stubble as he thought. "Well, you saw what Yang uses, right? Gauntlets?"

"Ugh, don't remind me." The fox faunus grumbled. She was basically the one to show how to bypass his semblance. One area attack and all his clones went 'poof!'.

"Heheh, yeah. She kicked your ass." The teacher laughed. Noticing the boy scowling at him he shrugged. "What? It was hilarious! Heheh, 'poof'!"

"Come on, Teach!" Naruto whined.

"Alright, alright, sorry!" Qrow raised his hands in defense before wiping a tear of laughter from his eye. "Hahhh, but you get my point, right? Something small that won't get in the way of how you usually fight."

"Hn." Naruto grunted before taking a moment to think. What the teacher was saying made sense. It would take too long if he had to learn a whole new fighting style to accompany his new weapon. Should he get something like gauntlets like that blonde girl?

"_Eww, look it's the fleabag!"_

"_Careful, I bet he's rabid!"_

"_Release the hounds!"_

"Hey, Teach. What about claws?" If they think he's an animal, fine. He was going own it.

"Hm." Qrow considered. "Not a bad idea. I mean you're probably doing it just to thumb your nose at the other kids giving you crap about being a faunus but-"

_'Oh, crap is he a psychic?!'_ Naruto thought in panic.

"It might actually work pretty well. It'll still mean adjusting your style a little but nowhere near as much as most anything else would. Alright, so hands? Or feet?"

"Could it be both?" Naruto asked.

"Ehh... Kinda?" Qrow answered vaguely, wobbling his hand in a 'so-so' gesture. "I mean the problem with blades on your feet is them getting stuck. Leaves you unbalanced until you get both of 'em under you again."

"I still wanna try." Naruto said firmly.

Qrow shrugged. "No skin off my nose. How 'bout a ranged option? For this I'd say just the hands for now. Guns on your legs takes a, uh... a _lot_ of practice."

Naruto shrugged. "Never really used guns before. What do you think?"

"Well..." Qrow started, standing up and walking over to a nearby weapon rack. "The way I see it, you have two options." Taking an automatic weapon off the rack he heads to the firing range. Checking and loading it, he continued. "You could go with an automatic small calibre like this." He demonstrated by unloading a full clip into the target dozens of punctures peppering the middle two rings of the target. "Rapid-fire, small hits. Since your semblance will duplicate them you could make a literal wall of bullets."

"And the drawbacks?" Naruto asked.

Qrow bit the inside of his cheek. "Small hits. For the bigger, badder Grimm, one bullet is the same as a thousand. Neither will do anything."

"There are Grimm that strong?!" Naruto exclaimed.

"And stronger." Qrow nodded grimly. "Which is why…" He began as he lifted a grenade launcher. "This is your other option." Firing a grenade down the range, there was a moderate explosion that took out three targets in their entirety. "Big hits. And again with your semblance it could be a dozen big hits at once." He finished, smirking. Qrow admitted to himself that he had a soft spot for a big kaboom.

"Well, ya see..." Naruto hesitated. He wasn't sure of his big idea but it wouldn't happen if he didn't talk about it. "I kind of have an idea for that anyway but..."

"But what?" Qrow pressed.

"Well," Naruto said, shuffling as he pulled out a sketch from his coat pocket. "I kinda had an idea for my combat gear."

Qrow put the grenade launcher back on the rack and snatched the sketch from the fox faunus' hand. _'Huh. Actually not bad. It's eye catching. No idea what those designs are but this could wor-'_ His train of thought was knocked off the tracks when he read the notes on the page. "Orange dust." he deadpanned.

"W-well it is my favourite colour! Heheh... heh." Naruto laughed awkwardly.

"Orange."

"Uh huh."

"In your clothes."

"Yeah?"

Qrow Branwen swallowed thickly. The proverbial devil and angel sitting on his shoulders.

_'It's insane!'_

_**'But ingenious!' **_

_'But insane?!'_

_**'We've seen crazier.'**_

_'And what are those people now?!'_

_**'Some of the strongest hunters on Remnant!'**_

_'Yeah... Or __dead__!'_

"Uhh, teach?" Naruto hazarded. The combat teacher had been quiet for a while and kept... _twitching_. The fox faunus was honestly getting a little worried.

Snapping out of his daze, Qrow looked at Naruto with seeing eyes again. He took a deep breath and returned to his desk, pulling out a flask and taking a long pull from it. "Okay. Here's how this is going to work." Qrow stated in a no-nonsense tone as he wiped his mouth. I'm going to get this made up for you. It's actually a good design. _But!_ I'll have two sets made. One with the... _enhancement_, one without. You will _not_ use the enhanced version unless you _really freakin' think_ you're gonna need it. And even then, I'm gonna have _so many_ safeties put in that you can't use it unless you really want to. _Got it?!_"

The fox nodded, wide-eyed having never seen the combat teacher so serious.

The teacher took another deep breath. "Okay. So four claws and the arms with machineguns mounted on them. Got it. I'll set it up, just... Just go away."

Naruto nodded and practically ran from the room. Qrow sighed as he watched the boy leave. "I swear I'm gonna drink myself under the table."

"Hey, Uncle Qrow I'm here for training!"

"Ahh, dammit."

-(-)-

_Several weeks later_

"_Awesome_." Naruto breathed as he looked over his new implements.

"Yeah, thought you might like 'em." Qrow smirked. This was probably the best part of his job seeing the kids gush over their new toys. Well, watching them beat the crap out of each other might be a _little _more fun. But this was a close second.

"These are so much cooler than I thought they'd be! I mean I thought they'd just be claws but they're retractable and the guns are _so freaking tiny_ and _this is so awesome!_"

"Yeah, I know right? Now remember, when using the guns-"

"_Awesome_."

"Dammit kid, shut your trap let me explain how they work!"

-(-)-

A/N: Heeheehee! Yeah. Been sitting on how Naruto's stuff would work for a long while. I'm fairly certain there's no canon or word of god knowledge of what orange dust does but... I think you can figure out what it does here.

So there were three future Beacon students mentioned in this chapter. You should also be able to guess who they are.

Anyway, we're going to do a bit of a training thing next chapter, then we pretty much get to canon. Yay!

As usual, Fandom Flux youtube channel plug. Podcasts, Let's Plays, we did a live commentary of Naruto the Last once, if that grabs ya.

Thanks for reading.


	5. Chapter 5

"Alright, kid. You ready to try these things out?" Qrow asked his student still absorbed in studying his new equipment.

Naruto held one of the four sets of claws by the wrist. While Qrow suggested claws, what he actually came back with was something more akin to gauntlets, heavily segmented to allow for freedom of movement and with separated fingers. Running along the back of each finger was a set of ridges that housed the claws themselves while retracted. Bending one of the fingers manually, he found even retracted the digits could bend freely, proving the claws were segmented as well. The body of it was painted in black with orange stripes running vaguely along where the bones of his hand would be and by extension, where the claws were sheathed. Close to the centre of the hand was a gun barrel attached to a small block that went the rest of the way up past wrist.

Cautiously putting the gauntlet on his right hand, Naruto found the thing to be suspiciously comfortable. It took a second to realise the inside wasn't solid, instead almost like a padded glove. Testing the range of movement, he found it was... okay. It was still restricting but he guessed only as much as was absolutely necessary for it to function as intended. He found himself confused when he tried to find a way to release the claws.

Leaning casually on his desk, Qrow took pity on him. "The switch near the middle finger."

Naruto felt around the base of his middle finger and found a small catch camouflaged in the black paint. Releasing it... Nothing happened. Naruto again looked confused at his teacher.

Qrow was grinning madly. He knew the next part would be his favourite. "Do this." He said, his fingers and thumb bent about halfway at every knuckle before suddenly straightening them with a snap movement.

Naruto watched and mimicked the movement. With a sharp 'snikt' sound, the claws released, each as long again as his finger. Naruto took in a deep breath of air-

"Awesome, right?" Qrow asked, grinning still.

"**AWESOME!**" Naruto shouted in absolute glee.

"Yeah, our guys don't half-ass their designs, I can tell you that." Qrow bragged. "Now those are bladed on both sides so I don't need to tell you, no handshakes when you're all 'rip-and-tear', got it? Just flip the switch again to retract 'em."

Naruto dutifully followed the implied order and with another 'snikt', the blades were sheathed. Naruto frowned. "Why not just have the claws come out with the switch?"

"They did originally." Qrow admitted. "Then the engineers figured out it was a pain in the ass to flip a switch with huge knives on your fingers." He paused. "Also, it makes you look really cool doing the finger thing." he smirked.

"So what about the gun?" Naruto asked.

"Alright, before we get to that, let me go over the basic rules of guns, okay?" Qrow said, unusually serious. Naruto nodded. "Okay rule one! A gun is always loaded. Especially when it isn't."

Naruto tried to look at him with one raised eyebrow, instead looking like he had something in his eye. "That doesn't make sense."

Qrow sighed. "It means just because you know for a fact you unloaded the magazine yourself, doesn't mean someone else hasn't been screwing around with it since. Basically, no matter how sure you are of how not dangerous your weapon currently is, _never_ ignore the rest of these rules. The number of people who got hurt because some moron _thought_ his weapon wasn't dangerous is not a small number. _Got it_?"

Naruto nodded hurriedly.

Qrow nodded slowly. "Rule two. Never point it at something you don't want to destroy. More difficult for you, what with them being on your arm but still important. Machines aren't perfect and they can misfire at the worst possible times if you let them."

"Rule three. Don't put your finger on the trigger until you're aiming at your target. One finger twitch is all that's between you and shooting something you don't want to shoot."

"And rule four. Be sure of your target _and _what's past your target. Say you and some other huntsmen are surrounding a Grimm. You shoot the Grimm but your buddy was on the other side of it. Congratulations, you just shot both the Grimm _and _your buddy. Bullets can penetrate. They go through things. So it's possible, even _likely_ that you'll shoot your target _and_ what's behind it. Even more for you because those are automatic weapons and they tend to spray. You got all that? Say it back to me."

"It's always loaded, don't point it at things I don't want to kill, don't touch the trigger unless I'm already aiming at the target, and know my target and what's past my target." Naruto recited, surprising himself with how much he could remember.

"Good." Qrow nodded satisfied. "Now, you're a dumb kid. That's fine. You'll screw those up from time to time. But just know I'm gonna beat your ass every time you do. Everyone who comes in this room has unlocked their aura so people getting accidentally shot isn't quite as big a deal in here as it is anywhere else. But it _is_ a problem anywhere else so we make damn sure those rules get tattooed onto your brain before we let you take your weapons out of here."

"Yes sir." Naruto nodded sharply.

"Alright. Now, put on your other gauntlet and let's do some target practice."

Naruto nodded again and put on his other gauntlet. It matched the one on his right hand exactly. He also tested out the movement and the claws for reasons of diligence (and absolutely not because it was awesome and he wanted to do it with both hands). Suited up as much as he needed to be for this exercise, he headed over to stand by his teacher at the firing range.

"Okay. Hands out, palm down." Qrow ordered.

Naruto dutifully raised his hands towards his teacher and immediately got a fist brought down on his head for it.

"IDIOT! What did I _just_ tell you?!" Qrow shouted.

Naruto ran the last few minutes through his head and realised even upside down, the barrel of _both _his weapons were pointed at his teacher. "Sorry, Teach."

Qrow slapped him across the side of his head for it anyway. "Don't do it again.", he admonished before pointing the boy's hands to either side of him.

Taking the right hand, he pointed at the box on the back of the faunus' wrist. "See this?" Getting a nod, "This is where the guts of your weapon are kept." Releasing a series of latches he removed the box itself which turned out to be more of a housing case. Inside where two very obvious slots and some machinery Naruto had no idea about. "Two slots here. What are they for?"

"Well that one's probably for the bullets." he figured, based on it being right up against the other gun... bits.

"Correct." Qrow agreed, slotting the magazine into place with a click. "And the other?"

Naruto shrugged. "I 'unno."

Qrow took a small tube filled with a yellow substance and placed it in the slot. "Claws out." He ordered.

Naruto flipped the safety switch and released his claws and was surprised to see yellow lines running along them and that they were sparking with electricity. "Dust." Naruto breathed.

"Nice, right?" Qrow smirked. "Pretty much all weapons designed nowadays have some compatibility with dust. Yours uses powdered dust to enhance the claws. It also requires dust rounds for your long range option. Ordinary rounds would be too small to have any power behind them at all. Basically your stuff is gonna be kind of expensive so go easy. Oz is bankrolling you for now but once you start taking missions at Beacon it'll be up to you to manage your own supplies." The teacher removed the dust cartridge and put the housing back on before telling his student to put his claws back in.

"You ready for some target practice?" Qrow asked smirking. Getting an eager nod he took his student by the shoulders and pointed him down range. "Now it's going to be difficult to aim because you can't sight it properly but-"

-(-)-

_Weeks later_

"Left, inward swipe! Right, inward swipe! No! You're leaning in too much, don't claw you're own face off!"

-(-)-

_Months later_

"Now remember your stepping method. Always heel-toe. They don't hinge in the same direction as the fingers so if you step toe-down you'll stab your feet in the floor!"

'_shink'_

"DAMMIT, STOP STABBING MY FLOOR, KID!"

-(-)-

_One week before graduation_

Naruto was tired of sparring practice. He used to enjoy it. Even when he was getting blasted across the room by the boxing bimbo he had fun with it. He enjoyed fighting, mostly because he was actually kind of good at it, that is, when he was allowed to be. Unfortunately there were a couple of things getting in his way during sparring practice. The first was, frankly, everyone was at least a couple steps ahead of him in either skill or gear or both.

The second... ever since he got his weapons, the combat instructor had handicapped him. His regular hand-to-hand style was basically that of a brawler. He knew how to read his opponent and capitalise on openings with fists, feet and the occasional full body tackle. But now that he had a weapon, he was expected to fight like he was using it, even though he wasn't. He didn't really get why. All Qrow would tell him was that he should shut up and trust that he knew what he was doing.

For the fox faunus... It was tough to swallow. His performance in sparring plummeted. People either thought he was a terrible fighter or he was mocking them. Both views led to people looking down on him even more than they already did.

"Fox. Thrush. You're up next. Get your gear." Qrow said as he watched the current bout.

Russell Thrush jogged towards the locker room smirking at Naruto as he passed. The fox faunus just let out a sigh of frustration.

"Fox, you hear me or not? Get your gear." Qrow repeated.

Naruto's head snapped up to look at his teacher in shock. In response Qrow just shot him a sidelong glance before winking at him.

Naruto grinned, some viciousness sneaking into his expression that he didn't even try to hide, before darting into the locker room.

A few minutes later the fight ended. Once again, Yang Xiaolong won against her opponent. Funnily enough the entire class somewhat hated the bubbly blonde, at least in terms of fighting. She was basically impossible for any of them to beat. A talented fighter taught by a master, with a semblance that meant even if you did start to win she could just 'rage-nope' you into a wall.

Fun to hang around with but fighting her was basically taking punishment. Qrow even used it as one a few times. She hadn't seemed to mind much.

The door to the locker room opened and the sound of Russell's laughter could be heard as he came out in his combat clothes. When asked why he was laughing he just laughed harder, sounding a little forced.

Then his opponent came out and they were even more confused.

Stepping out of the locker room, Naruto cut an unexpectedly impressive figure. His combat outfit shared some similarity to most of his casual clothes. A tailcoat coloured burnt orange with two concentric circles in black on each shoulder. A black shirt with comma-like symbols in orange patterned around the neck. Matching black trousers and belt with a circular orange belt buckle. On his hands and feet were gauntlets and boots, all oddly ridged and with the same orange and black colour scheme.

A few of the class looked back at Russell, as if to ask why he was laughing. Noticing their looks his giggles died down. "Ah, you didn't notice. He'll show you in a second."

Naruto followed the green-haired annoyance on to the sparring platform and stood opposite him around thirty feet away.

"Okay, kids. Same as always, weapons out, go on my signal." Qrow ordered sounding bored. It _was_ just another spar but at least this one might be kind of satisfying.

On that order, Thrush unsheathed his twin daggers, flipping them over his wrists and catching them in a ready position.

Naruto opposite him flipped the safeties off his gauntlets before clicking his heels together and flexing his fingers out, extending all four sets of claws. A couple of the class laughed, finally getting the joke.

"I guess we really did get to ya, huh?" Russell taunted. "Much as you tried to pretend we didn't."

"Yeah. You did." the fox agreed. "Consider me gotten. Guess that makes it my turn, right?"

"Go."

Russell didn't hesitate in the slightest, dashing forward to take the initiative. Jumping into a front-flip he brought each of his daggers down in turn, both blocked by both sets of finger claws. Using the impact to push himself back a bit, the mohawked boy got his feet under him before starting another series of rapid strikes. He had trained extensively in an acrobatic style, incorporating spins and flips into his movements as a matter of course.

Claws not being an ideal implement for defense, Naruto decided not to try and weather the blows, spinning and sweeping one of his legs through both of Russell's, knocking his opponent off his feet briefly. Sadly the boy was used to finding his feet and was already ready for the next clash.

The momentum was on Naruto's side and he capitalised on it. Taking a page out of Russell's book, he rushed in but instead of rapid strikes went all out on a jump kick. Russell tried to block with a dagger but it wasn't enough. The toe of Naruto's boot struck the dagger but that just meant the claws pushed past it, impacting him in the chest. As the boy was pushed back the weapon caught between the fox's claws was ripped out of his hand.

Russell rolled backwards to get distance before he noticed one of his hands was empty. Looking at Naruto, he saw the faunus smirking at him, holding the dagger awkwardly between his fingers before flick-throwing it at Qrow who caught it easily. Russell knew, he could go get it, but it would mean forfeiting.

"You're not using your semblance." Russell noted. The blond faunus was known to abuse the hell out of it before to keep up.

"Nope." Naruto confirmed. "Want to see if I can stack up without it. Problem?"

"Alright. Just weapons then." Russell nodded.

"If that makes you feel better about where this is going, sure." Naruto smiled menacingly. "But just so we're clear," He said as he started moving again. "It's still going to go there."

The fox approached the human and began a series of slashes, aiming to overwhelm much as the opponent had at the start of the fight. A left slash, a right, another low sweep, a rising slash, all either cautiously blocked or nimbly dodged while the human tried to back off, waiting for his opening.

It never came.

With a right slash Naruto moved into one of his most reliable combinations by starting to spin. One slash. Two. Three. The dagger flew out of his hand. Four. A kicking slash. Five. Six. Another kick. And so it kept going.

And going.

As the beating continued, a blonde with impressive hair sidled up to the teacher asking him quietly, "Shouldn't you stop this? He's already lost his weapons."

Qrow shrugged. "Happens in a fight sometimes. Doesn't mean you've lost. Besides, Thrush kind of has this coming. It'll be good for him. Probably."

"But-!" Yang started.

"You didn't have these concerns when it was the fox on the receiving end, Yang." His niece's jaw snapped shut with an audible click. "Haha, don't wear that face, Firecracker! It happens. And besides, Thrush could probably turn this around if he used his semblance. That he isn't is his choice. And if he loses because of it, that'll be another lesson for him." Watching the display of the combatants' aura, he waited for Thrush's meter to get low enough to stop the fight but high enough that he would have time to stop Fox.

"Alright, that's enough." True to his prediction, Naruto got in a couple more strikes mostly out of momentum before planting his feet firmly, his upper body wobbling unsteadily. "Winner: Naruto Fox."

-(-)-

A/N: Welp. That fight scene went about as well as I expected it to. Still wish I was better at those but y'know how it goes. Practice practice practice. Doesn't help that the match was basically between two high(ish) speed, acrobatic fighters. That's... really hard to write and probably benefits from a more general approach to narration. Meh. Live and learn.

EDIT: Thanks to Mo Eazy for suggesting a name for Naruto's weapon. They suggested "Final Insult", for the reason he chose it. I tweaked that a bit and came out with "Kuchigotae" which means retort, or back-talk.

Fandom Flux youtube channel. Yes I said it in the last chapter two days ago but unlike a certain Kenchi I'm diligent about my self-promotion, thank you very much! ... Though he did mention it in his latest chapter. Maybe I should lay off.

Thanks for reading.


	6. Orange Trailer

A Faunus civil rights protest. They weren't a particularly common occurrence in Atlas. It was basically asking to be taken in for 'civil disobedience' and sentenced to 'community service'. In plain terms, being sent to one of the Schnee dust factories or mines and never being seen or heard from again.

But the SDC had nowhere near as much power over Vale as it did over Atlas. And however many humans would sneer at Faunus as they passed them in the street, there was a certain measure of tolerance for Faunus 'antics'. They would shout chants, wave signs and ruffle a few feathers and then go back to doing what they usually did. And not a difference was made.

But it was that indifference that led to one Naruto Fox attending the festivities. Not taking part, mind you. His survival instincts from Atlas continued to tell him not let himself be noticed at an event like this. But he was satisfied to watch from his bench seat as the protest went on. It was actually a rather nice day. The whole thing was being held at a park across from the government offices. It was a pleasant way to spend a day, surrounded by people who _knew_. Better than Blaine could. Better than Ozpin could.

Hey, maybe one day his instincts would shut up and he could join in?

"Excuse me! Did you need a sign?" A sweet, cheerful voice asked.

The fox Faunus looked up to see one of the most adorable girls he had ever seen. She looked to be about his age, maybe a little younger. Wood brown hair cut in a bob topped with little bear ears, big green eyes, and tiny fangs peeking through her innocent smile. Dressed in a black t-shirt, dark grey vest and black jeans, she held out a sign for him to take. It read 'We are NOT ANIMALS!'.

"Uh... Ah..." He started holding up his hands to wave away her offer and politely decline but the words just wouldn't come out.

Unfortunately, waving around his hands without saying anything just drew her attention to them. And their... unusual accoutrements. "Oh, _wow_! Are you a huntsman?!" She asked with very convincing enthusiasm.

"Ah... Um, not really...? I mean I'm still in training..." He stammered awkwardly.

She... didn't seem to be listening. "Oh my gosh, that's so amazing that a huntsman came to our protest! It would be so great if you could say something! _Please?_" She begged, dropping her signs to clasp her hands together, biting her bottom lip.

_'Oh, no it's that look!'_ Naruto mentally screamed. _'I hate that look! And she's way better at it than Kaine ever was!'_ He tried to look away. Tried to steel himself to say no and see that look of hope turn to disappointment- "Okay." _'WHAT?! No! Bad mouth! You said a stupid thing!'_

And then the bear-girl's face lit up and she squealed with joy and all was forgiven. "Yay! Oh my gosh this is going to be so great!" She exclaimed as she pulled him up from his seat and started leading him into the crowd. "Now I'm just gonna do an introduction for you and then you can say what you want to say. Umm, what's your name?" She asked, sheepishly as she continued dragging him to a little podium the protest had set up.

"Naruto Fox?" Naruto said, it coming out as a question.

"I'm Topaz Smoke! Nice to meet you!" She chirped with a smile and let go of his hand as she got up on the podium. She whispered in the ear of the man leading the chants, an older blond boy with horse ears. He nodded and handed her the microphone.

Naruto's stomach started tying itself in knots.

"My fellow Faunus," She spoke into the microphone, her voice amplified by the speakers at the sides of the podium. The whole crowd started to quiet down. "We have a special guest today who would like to say a few words. It's my pleasure to introduce to you all, the huntsman-"

"-in training" She added sotto voice away from the microphone-

"-Naruto Fox!"

Naruto let loose a deep breath. _'So she did hear me say I'm in training. And yet she dragged me up here anyway. That girl is dangerous.'_

As Naruto stepped onto the podium he noticed there was confusion in the crowd that a huntsman that they hadn't heard of before – a _Faunus_ huntsman at that – was about to speak. Still, they were receptive and offered polite applause and a few cheers.

Naruto was no stranger to speeches. He'd made a few to his family in the past. The microphone was new. The complete lack of preparation was also new. But he decided to give it his best and racked his brain for something to say.

"My fellow Faunus," He started, imitating Topaz as he searched for the right words. _'This rally isn't about fear or hatred. Let's go with hope instead._' "Only half a century ago, the humans thought of us as pests. Nowadays you might hear some humans openly call us 'vermin' but that's not what I mean. I mean they literally saw us on the same level as the rats infesting their sewer, or the insects crawling around in their walls. We didn't belong in their ivory castles, and they did their best to step on us when they could, and force us out when they couldn't."

He surveyed the crowd, he couldn't place exact reactions due to how fast he did it and how much focus he was using for his impromptu speech, but nobody appeared to be heavily adverse to his words so far. So, so far so good as far as he was concerned. "They came up with a way to keep us out. They came up with a place where they could lock us away like the beasts they decided we were."

He paused a beat, shifting his look to something just a noticeable bit more stern. "We said 'no'."

"The Faunus people declared in one voice that they – that _we_ – would not be caged! That we would not be controlled! This freedom that we experience today is a freedom that our people fought, bled and _died _for! We have earned the right to stand right here, not two hundred yards from the seat of the Vale government and proudly say that we are _also_ the people of Vale and _we will be acknowledged!_"

A cheer rose up from the crowd as if to prove him right.

Gaining confidence with the crowd's approval, the fox Faunus continued. "The White Fang would tell you that protests like this don't matter. That they only reason we've made so much progress is because we bled it from the humans. They would say the only way to get them to treat us as true equals is to keep bleeding them until they beg us to stop."

He slammed a fist down on the podium, caught up in his own speech's energy. "I don't believe that. I refuse to believe that! The humans saw us as beasts. The methods of the White Fang only prove them right. We _need_ to be more than what they expect from us! Be smart! Be capable! Be _determined_. Be everything the humans are and then some! With every success, prove that every time they called us 'vermin', they called themselves 'idiots'!"

"The only idiot here is you, _boy_."

The voice came as though from a megaphone. Loud and distorted. Naruto looked around, searching for the source. Having been so focused on his speech, he hadn't noticed the small aircraft that had appeared above the park. An emblem was painted on the side, a wolf's head with three claw marks through it.

"The White Fang..." Naruto breathed. It came out louder than expected. Noticing he was still holding the microphone, he made the most obvious judgement call of his life. "Everyone, evacuate the area, now!" Some ran, but most were petrified with fear. Not having that, Naruto smacked the microphone on the podium, holding back so he didn't destroy it. The loud bang followed by shrill feedback from the speakers snapped the crowd out of it. "Run, you idiots!"

Finally wising up to the increasingly dangerous situation, they scattered in all directions to get away. Not willing to let the humans in the crowd off so easily, two men in Grimm masks appeared from inside the Bullhead class aircraft and opened fire on any targets without animal features.

Not willing to let that go, the fox Faunus clicked off the safety on his gauntlets but kept the claws sheathed. Instead, pointing one hand at the airship and putting the other on the top of his wrist, gripping the trigger there and pulling, unloading lightning dust rounds into the ship. It wasn't enough to damage the Bullhead but it got the White Fang grunts to take cover.

"You will not interfere with our justice, traitor!" The same voice from before spoke before a large man jumped out of the Bullhead. He wore similar to the standard White Fang uniform of black trousers and gloves but his upper body was covered by a white sleeveless top with high collar and low neckline. His face was covered by a Grimm mask like the others but with a more elaborate design, somewhat resembling the white half of a King Tajitu.

Oh. He also had a chainsaw.

… That was probably more important than his shirt, wasn't it?

The heavily muscled man landed hard in a crouch on the concrete slabs of the park paths but seemed no worse for wear from it. Standing to his full height, he casually revved his chainsaw.

And the grunts started firing on the fleeing civilians again.

"Not having that." Naruto muttered as he made a cross sign with his fingers. He didn't wait for the smoke to clear before giving his order, "Keep those clowns covered!"

An identical copy of the fox dashed out of the cloud, already opening fire on the Bullhead as his creator had ordered.

"I know of you, Fox." The musclebound man started, his accent that of the Mistral wilderness. "We wanted to recruit you after what happened in Atlas. Why would you turn your back on your people for _them_?" He asked with venom.

"I-" Naruto started.

"Never mind. I don't care." The White Fang Lieutenant said. "All that matters now is that you are a TRAITOR!" He roared as he dashed forward swinging his chainsaw in a wide arc.

Naruto reacted quickly, unsheathing his claws in a split second but not bothering to try blocking a chainsaw with them. Strong they might be, but indestructible they were _not_. And a high-power chainsaw could easily be enough to break them. Instead he opted for backing as quickly as he could to stay out of range of the large man's swings. Noticing a chance as the Lieutenant went for an overhead swing, Naruto rolled forwards behind his enemy and swung his hand claws at the larger man's legs. The first landed, the second was blocked by a back kick.

The Lieutenant had been holding his swing, knowing he was leaving himself open and wondering what the fox would do. Disappointed, but curiosity satisfied, he spun around and brought the chainsaw down on the fox Faunus.

Desperate, Naruto rolled sideways awkwardly, his foot claws getting in the way but allowing him to barely dodge the teeth of the weapon.

Behind the Lieutenant, a figure emerged from behind the podium and opened fire, dust rounds started raining down on the man's unprotected back causing him to stumble and whirl around with a snarl. He growled audibly on seeing who it was, raising his chainsaw to block the continuing shots.

"Haa... Did you really think I made just one?" Naruto smirked. The smirk fell from his face however, when the White Fang member sank into the ground. A moment later he came up again right underneath the clone behind the podium, bisecting him with the chainsaw as he came up.

Another three streams of dust rounds came at him immediately afterwards.

"Did you really think I made just tw-"

"SHUT IT, TRAITOR!" The Lieutenant roared as he took cover behind the podium. Unknown to the fox Faunus, he sank into the ground again, coming up elsewhere. Looking around, he took stock of the situation. All of the civilians were gone and he could hear sirens coming. The mission was a bust and it wasn't worth capture to kill the traitor. Decision made, he sank into the earth again.

Naruto was in the middle of creating more clones when he saw the chainsaw wielding terrorist shoot out of the ground like a rocket directly under the Bullhead, grabbing onto the cabin edge as he reached his apex. Climbing inside he ordered the pilot to return to base.

Naruto watched it leave with a frown before surveying the area. There were people hurt, mostly human. He sighed, but resigned himself to giving first aid until the authorities arrived. They wouldn't thank him for it, but that didn't matter. It was the right thing to do.

"St-stay away from me!" The injured man shouted as Naruto approached.

In response, the blond Faunus shrugged. "Okay. Have fun bleeding out." He said as he moved on to the next person.

Then again. If they wanted to be idiots, he was content to let them.

-(-)-

A/N: I'm not going to say anything. I'm just gonna let these chapters keep rolling while I can.

So if people are wondering when this takes place, this is actually a canon event. In episode 1 a news report talks about a Faunus rights rally that gets crashed by the White Fang. So to date this, it would be after the trailers but before the events of episode 1.

Also, I figured I'd do a dramatis personae for all of the OCs in the story so far. If new ones are added later I'll put them in the relevant chapter notes. So far we have:

Blaine David: Blaine Gibson (shocking, neh?)

Burnie: Burnie Burns (*gasp*)

Brandon: Brandon Farmahini (no way!)

Jankin Schnee: Whoever voices him in the show (bet you he's voiced for volume 4)

George Gerontio: Taliesin Jaffe

Topaz Smoke: Laura Bailey

By the way. Total accident giving the bear faunus the name "Smoke". I was looking up shades of brown to describe her hair colour (and give her a name based on it) and it was RIGHT THERE! How could I not use that?! So... Yeah. A genderbent Smokey the Bear is now in this story.

Also, I will take any opportunity to quote Jon Irenicus. No one reading this knows who that character is but you should.

Alright. That's about it.

Thanks for reading.


	7. Chapter 7

"Do you have everything packed?"

"Yes, Blaine."

"Including your weights?"

"They'll have weights at the school, Blaine."

"A man should have his own weights. 'Heavy burdens now makes carrying future burdens all the easier.' - Brocrates."

"... I'm pretty sure that wasn't his name. And also that he didn't say anything like that."

"Fox boy." Naruto felt a weighty, powerful hand drop onto his shoulder and squeeze lightly. "You should take your own weights."

Naruto opened his mouth to respond and froze as the pressure on his shoulder started to increase. Slowly turning his head to look at Blaine, he saw the former huntsman with a solemn look on his face, nodding slowly as though his head was bobbing to an unheard rhythm. Sighing defeatedly, Naruto's head sank. "I'll take my weights." he agreed, sullen.

Blaine slapped him on the back hard enough to stagger him. "Good man! Now, let us thank Brodin for conferring this new wisdom unto you! Mighty Brodin, who is in the Iron Temple, hallowed be thy-" Blaine chanted, moving through bodybuilding poses as he went.

"I'm gonna go pack again." Naruto called as he returned to his room for what would hopefully be the last time. Blaine might have shared a home him while not at school but he really was too much to handle sometimes.

"Don't forget your spares!" Blaine called after him in the most muscular pose.

"Right!" Naruto answered. '_At least he's not doing it in a speedo this time.'_

-(-)-

The airship for Beacon students was... _grander_ than Naruto was expecting. On the outside it had appeared to be very similar to his transportation from Atlas to Vale, if _much_ larger. That part made sense what with the greater number of passengers. Something like 200 students attended Beacon at one time, he found out during one of his few periods of independent research.

No, it was the _inside_ that surprised him. Comfortably appointed, fancy looking arch windows lining both sides and soft bench seating running underneath on both sides. Viewscreens appeared at intervals along the walls, showing a live broadcast of the Vale News Network.

Naruto grimaced as another Beacon student looked at him then back to the news feed. The White Fang crashing a faunus rights rally was a big news story. A lone faunus fighting them off was apparently a _bigger_ one. He'd been getting attention any time he left the house for the past few days. Some old lady had come up to him out of the blue, said "You're one of the good ones.", gave him a nod and walked off. What the hell was he supposed to do with that? It sounded like it was _meant_ as a compliment but something about it offended him and he wasn't sure what it was.

Mentally shrugging it off, Naruto looked around at the other students. A lot of them were returning after the summer break but some were clearly new. The blond boy in old fashioned armour and casual clothes looked sick with nerves. The short girl in black and red looking uncomfortable with... _Yang_. He shuddered and moved on. Then there was... His jaw hung open on seeing the welcome yet unwelcome familiar face making her way towards him. '_Oh, there is no way._' "Why. Why are you here."

"Well that's a pretty silly question!" the chirpy bear faunus responded with a warm, toothy smile.

Naruto cocked his head to one side. "You know, you're right? That was a dumb question since the answer's obvious. But that just raises further questions, ya know? Like, 'If you're a student at Beacon, why the hell'd you bail at the rally?'"

She tilted her head, a thoughtful expression on her face. "Because I don't want the White Fang to kill me?" she ask-answered, before smiling again. "You seemed up for it though, so I figured I should let you do your thing!"

"That's nice of you." Naruto deadpanned.

"Thanks!" she chirped.

"I was being sarcastic, ya know!" Naruto growled.

"Oh, well then you're a jerk!" the bear girl corrected, still wearing a carefree smile.

Naruto gave her a queer look. "It's... really hard to stay mad at you when you're always smiling like that, ya know.", he grumbled.

Something in her eyes changed, another emotion leaking through her friendly façade. Not necessarily malice. More... mischievous, maybe? "I know, right? You should try it! Really takes the wind out of humans' sails when they want to pick a fight."

An unpleasant memory reared its' head in the fox's mind. "I, uh... I used to... I don't do that anymore."

"Huh? Why's that?" she asked, her expression back to the pleasant smile.

"It's not important." he dodged.

"Well, _yeah_, but that doesn't mean I don't wanna know." she pushed.

"Look..." he searched for her name, "Topaz. Just drop it."

"But-"

"Hey, Whiskers!" a new voice chimed in. Naruto's head immediately snapped in the direction of the voice, jaw set, eyes narrowed in anger. "Whoa, easy there!" Yang put her hands up in a placating gesture. "Just wanted to meet your new friend!"

Topaz looked from Naruto and his slowly relaxing expression to the blonde girl's bewildered eyes darting back and forth between the two faunus. "You know this girl?" she asked Naruto.

"Not... really?" he answered slowly. "I mean we were in combat class together for a year but the most interaction we had was her handing me my ass every few weeks." He shrugged, seeing no harm in the girl's request. "Topaz Smoke, Yang Xiao-Long. Yang, Topaz."

"Nice to meet ya!" Yang greeted, bouncing on the spot. "And this is-" she started as she turned only to see empty space behind her "not here." she frowned. "Sorry, I was gonna introduce you to my little sister but she's kind of... socially..."

"Retarded?" Topaz suggested helpfully.

Yang narrowed her eyes at the girl who was still smiling at her. "I am, like, a _thousand_ percent sure there's a better word than that but... Kinda." she admitted.

Suddenly, as the news was recounting the story of a string of robberies the viewscreens vanished, replaced by a holographic image of a stern-looking woman with an incongruously sweet voice. "Hello and welcome to Beacon!", the woman spoke. "My name is Glynda Goodwitch. You are among a privileged few who have received the honour of being selected to attend this prestigious academy. Our world is experiencing an incredible time of peace and as future huntsmen and huntresses, it is your duty to uphold it. You have demonstrated the courage needed for such a task. And now it is our turn to provide you with the knowledge and the training to protect our world." With that, the hologram faded and all of the students who had previously been watching it, now saw out of the window their first view of their new home for off in the distance.

"Yang! Yang!" a voice called from a nearby window. "Look, you can see Signal from here!"

Yang gave the two faunus a lazy wave and smile before moving to join her sister at the window. Naruto, wasn't paying attention though. Instead he was running the hologram's speech through his head. "Our duty to uphold peace, huh?"

Sounded like 'hold the line' to him.

-(-)-

Naruto's first impression of Beacon Academy was... _big_. Big and fancy and extravagant and all sorts of other impressive sounding adjectives. Signal he could handle. One big building with a tower in the middle. Beacon? Over a dozen buildings the size of Signal all with ancient-inspired architecture to make it look even grander than it already did. The path from the airship to the academy proper was at least a quarter mile long and the only thing you could do while walking it was marvel at how impressive the Academy was.

A year ago Naruto had been living in a hole in the ground. The drastic change was making him dizzy.

Shaking his head to clear the fog in his thoughts, he instead decided to focus on his... acquaintance. Topaz had decided to walk with him to the academy. He wasn't sure what to make of her. She annoyed him but could smile and the feeling would go away. Related to that, he was uncomfortable with how easily she could manipulate him. The right tone of voice and 'that look' and he crumbled. He needed to figure out a way to avoid it in future.

Pushing that aside, he tried to strike up a conversation instead. "Didn't they tell us to be ready in our combat gear?" he asked the girl. He was wearing his. Either her battle outfit was very simple, basically the same vest-shirt-pants outfit from when he met her, or she wasn't wearing hers.

Her constant smile turned sheepish. "My outfit is kind of... heavy. And bulky. Not really the kind of thing I would wear unless I really need to. I asked ahead and they said it's only for ceremony that we wear our fighting gear today so it's fine."

'Heavy? Like armour?' Naruto wondered, looking her over. That didn't seem right for a girl of her stature.

Topaz noticed him looking and stopped, giggling. "Like what you see?", she asked, striking a pose.

And so, faced with flirting so obvious the girl may as well have held up a sign with red flashing lights reading 'I'M FLIRTING WITH YOU', the fox faunus' brain entirely locked up. All it could come up with as a response was a slightly slack-jawed "Uhhh..."

Luckily for the vulpine teenager, the sound of something collapsing boxes saved him from saying something stupid. Head swinging around to observe the welcome distraction he saw the girl in black and red from the airship on the ground being berated by some other girl in an outfit so white it gave him eye-strain to look at it. He was satisfied with just watching after mentally labelling white girl as a bitch and red girl as a doormat. That is until white girl pulled out a container of red dust and started waving it about wildly. Seeing something that could end in disaster, Naruto quickly moved to intervene, moving into the white girl's blind spot and snatching the small jar of red dust out of her hand.

"Wha- Hey!" she complained in a whiny tone. "How dare you! Give that back!" she demanded, reaching for it.

Naruto merely swayed his arm back out of her reach. "Not until you tell me who taught you how to handle dust!" he denied, surprised by how much it pissed him off seeing someone do something stupidly dangerous. Qrow must have rubbed off on him a little, he decided. "I'm just minding my own business over there and then I see you yelling at some girl, then you start swinging this in front of her face like it's a salt-shaker instead of an unstable explosive!"

"Red dust isn't explosive, you dolt! It's combustible!" the girl fumed, choosing to attack him back rather than acknowledge any point he was making. "Now give that back before I report you to the authorities for stealing!"

Naruto rolled his eyes, reaffixing the stopper on the container so it was properly sealed before handing it back to her. In response, the girl turned with a "Hmph!" and an upturned nose before walking away.

It was at about this point that Naruto's anger dissipated and his brain started to catch up to his actions and the facts of the situation. Namely, noticing the very obvious symbol embroidered into the back of the girl's dress. "Ohhh, shit."

"It was very brave of you to stand up to her." a new voice said. Female.

Naruto didn't turn to acknowledge the newcomer. "Ohhh, shit."

"But her family is very powerful, and is no friend to the faunus. You should be more careful around her." the new voice warned before walking in the same direction as the white girl. Since Naruto's eyes hadn't moved in the slightest his barely functioning mind finally attributed the voice to the girl. Black hair with a black bow, black and white outfit.

"Ohhh, shit."

During this little exchange, Ruby Rose got to her feet and looked at the two departing girls before switching to watching the blond boy. 'Faunus." she amended her description, noticing his extra set of ears. 'Alright, Ruby! You can do this! Time to make a friend!' "Um, hi!"

No response.

"Um, hello?" she repeated timidly. "Are you okay?" she asked, touching his arm.

"Yah!" Naruto yelled in alarm at the contact, eyes darting around searching for the hidden SDC ninjas he was expecting to hunt him down. Instead, all he found was the black-red haired girl that had been on the floor last he checked. "Ah, sorry!" he apologised, trying to forcibly calm his nerves. "You, ah, you surprised me, ya know!"

"Sorry." the girl said before visibly gathering her confidence. "Um! I'm Ruby! Rose! Ruby Rose, that's me!" she exclaimed, her cheerful expression shaky as she realised exactly how stupid that sounded.

"Heheh, nice to meet you Rubyrose Rubyrose!" he laughed. "I'm Naruto Fox!"

"That's a weird name." Ruby commented before her eyes widened. "I-I mean-!"

"Nah, don't worry about it, ya know! I know it's weird." he admitted, smiling to put the girl at ease. "Fox was Ozpin's suggestion since I didn't have a last name. Orphan and all. As for Naruto... I don't even know what it means, really. It's from this weird old language that had multiple alphabets so it could mean a bunch of different things."

"Huh. That's... kinda cool." Ruby observed before, again, realising what she just said and rushing to explain. "I mean, not the orphan thing. I mean the not knowing your name thing. Ahh! I mean-!"

"Woah, woah, calm down!" Naruto told her. "Just take a breath! I'm not gonna get offended by saying something dumb, trust me. I do that all the time."

Taking his advice, Ruby took a breath and figured out what she wanted to say. "I meant it's cool how your name can't define you since you don't know what it means or where it comes from. Like, my name's Ruby Rose and that's really similar to my Mom's name and I ended up a lot like her. But my sister Yang's name is like our Dad's and she took more after him. It's like, you don't know anything about your name so it can't define who you are, you know?"

"Huh." Naruto said eloquently. "That... Actually is kinda cool. I never thought of it that way." Quickly looking around, he tried to find Topaz but unsurprisingly, she seemed to have made herself scarce after the Schnee debacle. "We should probably get going, ya know?"

"Yeah. Um, do you know where we're supposed to go?" Ruby asked hopefully.

"I'm gonna guess the big building in the middle. If not, someone there can point us in the right direction." Naruto suggested.

"Great! Let's go!" Ruby cheered. Inside, she was also cheering. '_I did it!_'

-(-)-

A/N: Hah. Fun stuff. So Naruto finds out Topaz is actually a Beacon student like him and also finds out despite her being pretty he actually doesn't like her that much. Her habit of disappearing when things get bad probably has something to do with that. To be clear, she's an OC (ish, she's the girl from the faunus rally image in episode 1) and people don't like those. Well that works out fine because in this case, at least for now, you're pretty much not _supposed_ to like her. But we'll see how well I manage that.

As for canon characters, Yang is amused by him, Blake is mostly indifferent, Weiss hates him and Ruby likes him and is grateful to him for saving her from the mean girl.

And... Jaune doesn't get mentioned beyond being sick. Not intentional but he doesn't really have anything to contribute. Ruby wasn't alone and miserable so he couldn't do his nice guy thing.

Usual plug. Fandom Flux youtube channel. We talk writing. We talk storytelling. We talk shit. Also LPs sometimes.

Thanks for reading.


	8. Chapter 8

"So..." Ruby started awkwardly, suddenly at a loss for what to talk about. The ice was broken but she had no idea where to go from there. This was so much easier with her friends from school! They'd been her friends since conversations consisted of "Let's go play!" so actually coming up with meaningful things to talk about with someone new was... Well, it was something she'd never had to _do_ before.

There was _one_ thing she really wanted to ask about she thought, as her eyes drifted upward to his ears. Specifically the second set.

"You can ask, ya know." Naruto told her having caught her staring. "I won't mind."

"Really?" she checked, embarrassed at being caught.

"I can tell the difference between suspicion and curiosity." he answered with a grin that reached his eyes, lifting them in a vulpine fashion. "You don't much deal with faunus?"

"I don't think there _are_ any on Patch. Oh, that's where I grew up." she clarified. "So... What's it like?"

The blond gave her a blank look. "What's what like?"

"Being a faunus."

Naruto felt his lip curl unpleasantly before suppressing the reaction. She didn't know but wanted to know, to understand. So pushing down the instinct to lash out against someone poking the proverbial bear, he did a quick ten count in his head, loosed a deep, vocal sigh through his nose and answered, expressionless.

"We're considered criminal by default, even if proven otherwise. It's near impossible to get paying work. Even if we do they can still refuse to pay us and get away with it because "they're just faunus". We are denied any housing even if we can pay – of course, because we're faunus, the money _must_ be stolen – so we have to build our own homes. Which law enforcement will declare condemned and have destroyed on a whim. The best existence for a faunus is one where we stay hidden from humans. If we're discovered, best case scenario it's law enforcement who will punish us for 'vagrancy' and any other crimes real or imagined. Worst case is the SDC come to drag us off to 'volunteer' to work in one of their dust mines as slave labour."

"At least," Naruto paused, his face one of consideration. "That's how it was in Atlas. It's... better, here. Not as much as I'd like, but at least we can _live_ here, not just survive, ya know?" he said, finishing in a question as he looked back at Ruby, proud of himself for not going off on her.

That was, until he saw the girl's expression. Like the shards of the moon had fallen on Remnant and killed her dog, like the world was more pointlessly cruel than she could ever conceive before the revelation.

"U-um..." Ruby's mouth had gone dry. The words stuck in her throat so she forced them out in a croak. "I meant... What's it like having the cool extra ears."

The small girl stared at the fox faunus unblinking as she waited for his response.

He blinked.

Once.

Twice.

"Pff..."

The response she got wasn't what she was expecting.

"Pffhahahaha!" Naruto laughed, a deep laugh. One that seemed to come from the depths of his soul, one that he really needed more than he ever realised.

Ruby continued to watch him with a quizzical expression, not sure whether he was laughing at _her_ or something else.

Naruto's laughter died down, his hands went from his knees to wiping at his watering eyes. "Oh, man! I had _no_ idea how much I needed that." he said, lifting his head to look at the girl again, a satisfied smirk crossing his face.

The girl in red remained confused. "Glad I could help? … I think." Seeing him then, she decided she preferred him this way. The doom and gloom didn't suit him _at all_. Without the dour attitude he was actually kind of handsome and that smirk kind of reminded her of Uncle Qrow...

Having those two thoughts back to back was terrible and she vowed to never let it happen again.

They remained true, though. The fox faunus just had a look and air about him that was kind of like Qrow's. Like he didn't have all the answers but didn't care and would just keep moving forward.

She suddenly noticed, at some point she had begun smiling too.

-(-)-

"And oh, man! They _itch_ sometimes, ya know?! For no reason!"

Ruby giggled at her new friend's commentary on the ins and outs of faunus ears as the two of them entered Beacon's auditorium.

"Seriously, no reason. One asshat asked if I had fleas when I started at Signal. One douchebag comment followed me the whole freakin' year. Huh. There he is." Naruto noded as he spotted and pointed out a weasel looking boy with a green mohawk. He was talking with some redheaded guy with fancy armour. "Got him back for it though. That was a good day." the fox finished with a satisfied smile.

The scythe-wielding girl nodded along as she observed all the new students filling the room, all of them seemingly taller than her. As she made a mental note to increase her milk intake, she spotted a mane of vivid blonde hair. "Oh! There's my sister!" she exclaimed before looking back at the fox faunus. "Umm, it was nice meeting you and-and-and talking to you and, umm, we'll hang out after initiation, okay?!"

Naruto nodded politely. "It's a date."

The girl's eyes widened as she stammered out a response. "Ahh, ahh, ahh, sure! Yes! Sure! Gotta go!", she babbled as she walked backwards away from him, her cheeks turning a vivid red. "Going now!" She turned and walked briskly in the direction of the blonde girl, mumbling to herself as she went.

'Nice girl', Naruto thought as she wandered off.

Meanwhile, Ruby was quickly working herself into a panic. "What did I just do! Why did he say- Did I agree to- YANG!" she ended her mumblings in a shout as she got within speaking distance of her sister.

"Oh, hey! How's your first day goin', little sister?" Yang asked, still facing the stage, looking aside at said sister.

"Oh! Well! It's going _great, _Yang! After you ditched me, I fell into some prissy girl's luggage, she yelled at me, then some guy came and saved me and we talked and he's kind of intense sometimes and did I mention he's a faunus but he's really nice and he's handsome when he smiles but then I think he asked me out on a date and then I think I said yes!"

Yang blinked as her sister gasped for air, having neglected to breathe during her tirade. "Wow. When I said you should try and make friends you just dove in head-first, huh?"

"_Help meeeee!_" Ruby rasped, her begging expression showing just how out of her depth she had found herself.

Yang sighed as she ran her younger sister's ramble through her head. It was something she had a lot of practice doing. "Okay. So you met a boy."

"Yes." Ruby answered, nodding sharply.

"And you like this boy and think he's handsome." Yang continued.

"W-well, we only met like a half hour ago..." Ruby dodged, her cheeks flushing again slightly.

"But what you saw, you liked." Yang pressed.

"... Maybe." the younger sister admitted, hiding as much as she could in her cloak.

Yang immediately wrapped her sister in a crushing hug! "_Aww_, you're so adorable! My baby sister is growing up!"

"Yang!" the smaller girl exclaimed, trying to slap-push her sisters arms away. "This is serious!"

"Oh, no no, I get it!" Yang said, releasing her sister. "Just got caught up in the moment, that's all. So you _think_ he asked you on a date."

"Well, I said we'd hang out after initiation and he said 'It's a date'", Ruby quoted in a passable imitation of the speaker's slight rasping voice.

"Oh. Well, just because he said 'date' doesn't mean it's a _date_ date." Yang tried explaining before something caught her attention. "Wait, was that you doing an impression just now? And you said he was a faunus... Don't tell me you're talking about-"

/_"I'll... Keep this brief."_\

A voice relayed through the auditorium speakers cut Yang's question off before it could form. The attention of all was suddenly rooted to the man on stage, seemingly appearing there without anyone noticing.

/_"You have travelled here today in search of knowledge. To hone your craft and acquire new skills. And when you have finished, you plan to dedicate your life to the protection of the people... But I look amongst you... And all I see is _wasted energy_. In need of purpose. _Direction_. You assume knowledge will free you of this, but your time at this school will prove that knowledge can only carry you so far. It is up to _you_ to take the first step."_\

The enigmatic speech from the headmaster was met with no applause. Not even a confused murmur. Just a sea of expressions ranging from quizzical to outright confused. As Headmaster Ozpin vacated the stage, the Deputy Headmistress Glynda Goodwitch stepped up to the microphone. /_"You will gather at the ballroom tonight. Tomorrow, your initiation begins. Be ready. You are dismissed."_\

-(-)-

"Nghhhhhh..." Naruto grumbled as daylight crept in through the floor-to-ceiling windows glare shining directly into his face. Squeezing his eyes closed even more tightly trying to fight it away, he tried to curl himself into the wall next to him.

It might have worked if someone hadn't decided to thump him in his very exposed back.

"Ng'morning." a female voice slurred from next to him, obviously the one that hit him.

"M'why'd you hi' me... L'me sleep..." he grumbled.

"I don' get to hid in the corner... I suffer..." the voice trailed off into a yawn, "you suffer."

"You suck, Topaz." Naruto said, finally submitting to wakefulness and rubbing the sleep from his eyes.

The girl, Topaz, yawned again. "Sweet talker."

-(-)-

"For years you have trained to become warriors and today your abilities will be evaluated in the Emerald Forest." the Headmaster explained, standing before the entire freshman class of Beacon Academy. All of them were standing on small metal pedestals, seemingly arranged like the starting line of a race.

Naruto was only half listening to the Headmaster, distracted by those to his sides. On his left, Topaz – in what seemed to be an enormous amalgamation of heavy armour and hazmat suit of brown and red colouring – was blowing him a kiss. On his right, Weiss Schnee was willing him to freeze solid with her glare alone.

He decided he was just not ready for today. Granted, he wasn't ready for any day where he was expected to wake at the crack of dawn, but also today in particular.

"Now, I'm sure many of you have heard rumours of the assignment of teams." Goodwitch continued, her short cape fluttering in the wind of the clifftop. "Allow us to put an end to your confusion. Each of you will be given teammates." she stated, pausing for effect. "Today."

"These teammates will be with you for the rest of your time here at Beacon." Ozpin picked up. "So it is in your best interest to be paired with someone with whom you can work well."

Naruto faintly heard a girl squeaking in discomfort.

"That being said, the first person you make eye-contact with after landing will be your partner for the next four years." the headmaster finished.

There was a brief surge of muttered conversation at that pronouncement, before Naruto noticed Topaz awkwardly trying to make a heart symbol with her hands' limited range of movement.

"After you've partnered up, make your way to the northern end of the forest. You will meet opposition along the way. Do not hesitate to destroy everything in your path, or you _will_ die. You will be monitored and graded for the duration of initiation but our instructors will not intervene. You will find an abandoned temple at the end of the path, containing several relics. Each pair must choose one and return to the top of the cliff. We will regard that item as well as your standing and grade you appropriately. Are there any questions?"

"Yeah. Um, sir?" one boy said, raising his hand awkwardly.

"Good! Now, take your positions." the headmaster ordered.

Naruto watched as everyone got into what looked like a ready fighting position, apparently knowing what was coming. This was new to him so he just did the same, unsheathing his claws and taking the opening stance of his own fighting style.

As he glanced down the line he saw the students to the far left start launching forwards into the air, one by one. Someone was saying something but he couldn't really pay much attention with his heart beat pulsing in his ears. This was some hardcore stuff they were doing on the first day!

One by one they were launched. It creeping ever closer to being Naruto's turn. He fully turned to look at Topaz when it came to her.

…

… Nothing happened.

Ozpin's conversation with whomever seemed to pause as everyone looked at Topaz, wondering why it stopped.

As the awkwardness built, Naruto started to hear a low, groaning sound. Like the straining of metal as it was stressed beyond its limits before the groan became an ear-piercing screech followed by a mechanical **clunk**.

Another awkward silence ensued, everyone continued to stare at Topaz in her enormous armoured bulk. Slowly she raised her hand. "Uhh, I should just... Go, then? I guess?" she hazarded, looking at the headmaster. He gave her a slow, hurrying nod. "Yeah." she said as she started to walk to the cliff edge before dropping off it, feet first.

Safe to say, the tension was broken, and Naruto wasn't given chance to worry again before his own pad launched him into the air.

-(-)-

A/N: Alright. This took more time than I'd like. I got stuck on bits of it but I think it was worth it in the end. Naruto probably comes off as a bit more mature than he is in his source material. That's because he is. He's had too much responsibility to still be acting like a mouthy little twerp. Basically, think of his character as being closer to what it was after the final battle. Or if you must, as similar to that godawful Naruto the Last movie.

Also, since this chapter probably seems pretty ship-heavy, feel free to suggest ship names. I'm curious what people might come up with.

That's all I got for now. Fandom Flux youtube channel is a thing that exists and should be enjoyed by the masses. Check out our New Years episode of the podcast this weekend where we talk about how rubbish 2016 has been.

Thanks for reading.


	9. Chapter 9

"_aaaaaaaaa_aaaaaaAAAAAAA**AAA**AAAaaaaaa_aaahhh_!"

The tiny black bird continued to glide gracefully as the four-eared, blond humanoid soared past it, beginning to arc downward into the forest below. The bird took little notice, choosing instead to enjoy its flight undisturbed.

"Birdy, no!"

**thwump!**

-(-)-

Naruto struggled to take in a gulp of air. The air resistance from moving at high speed didn't make it easy. In hindsight, screaming out all his oxygen probably didn't help him at all but potential imminent death seems to bring that reaction out of people.

'Okay, think think think think _think_. I can get out of this.' The trees slowly moved up to meet him, promising pain on impact. 'Right, telling myself to think isn't thinking. Okay... Grabbing a tree will break my arm... Maybe if it was a clone?'

Not having a better plan, he put his hands together, spawning two clones that shared his forward (and downward) momentum. Each clone grasped one of the originals arms and reached outward with the other, hoping to grab something on the way down.

As the three identical blonds passed through the tree canopy, the one on the left managed to snag a high branch with his claw blades towards the base. Three things happened in rapid succession: First, the momentum slowed slightly and shifted direction, slightly more forward than downward. Second, the claw blades (and the clone's fingers) broke from taking the impact poorly. Third, in reaction to the broken fingers, the clone vanished in a puff of smoke.

As the other clone and the original continued moving, the second clone found it had more time to choose a good hold thanks to the lessened speed. Taking advantage of this, the clone spotted a good, strong branch before it came into reach and reached out for that one specifically, managing a full, tight grasp on it as the two of them sank past it. As they dropped, the clone's arm took an enormous chunk of their momentum directly onto its shoulder socket, dislocating it and dispelling the clone.

All that was left was a ten-foot drop to solid ground. Safe enough even for those without aura if you know how to land well.

As he hit the ground feet first, Naruto took it on the balls of his feet and sprung forward in a roll. Taking a few deep breaths as he continued to ride the adrenaline, he slowly stood to his full height again, checking himself for injury. All things considered, he was a bit ruffled but otherwise, fine. Sheathing his claws, Naruto dusted himself off and started looking around.

'So, this is the Emerald Forest.' he thought to himself. 'Doesn't... really seem _greener_ than other forests. Hm.'

Putting bland naming conventions aside, he started walking in the direction he had been launched, assuming that was the direction he was supposed to go. 'So I'm looking for... relics. Relics that could be literally anything but I guess I'm supposed to know them when I see them? Oh, and find a partner. Right. I suppose... I mean I _could_ just double back to the cliffs and grab Topaz...' Images flashed through his mind of him waiting on her hand and foot for the next four years. '**Nope!** Nope. Pot luck it is!' he decided resolutely, shaking the horrible mental images away as he kept walking. 'I mean, come on! How bad could it-'

He stopped walking as a cracking scream cut the air above him followed by a loud thud and a wooden grinding. Dropping through the canopy, a blur shot past him, embedding into the tree and sliding down it, cutting two gouges into the bark with a pair of daggers. The form ripped its weapons from the tree and stood, taking a deep breath and revealing to Naruto's eyes a green mohawk. Time seemed to slow down for the fox faunus as the other boy he now knew to be Russell Thrush turned around.

'Noooooooo!' even his internal scream of anguish was slowed down to a bassy moan of horror, even as Russell dusted himself off and looked up to unwittingly lock eyes with Naruto.

"Crap!" Russell moaned thrashing his head back before cradling it in his arms.

Naruto's eye twitched. "Hey, if this makes you miserable at least I get _somethin'_ out of it."

-(-)-

Topaz yawned as she dropped like a lead weight off the cliff. She was a little embarrassed by the shenanigans with the launchpad and the fall down the cliff was worryingly long but none of that overrode the early wakeup call. Bears were not morning animals and neither was she one.

At around halfway down, her descent seemed to slow. Gradually at first, then down to a tenth of her previous velocity as she hit the ground in the ruins below, bending her knees to absorb what force remained. "That wasn't so bad." she mused to herself before looking back up. "Trip back up won't be as fun though." Shrugging, deciding such things were future Topaz' problem, she started to wander towards the forest, absently humming a random tune.

Watching the sky above she looked for the student who got launched the shortest distance. "He'll do." she decided as she saw one barely even reach the forest.

-(-)-

The two new 'partners', Russel and Naruto were getting along as well as one might expect. They walked side-by-side, though not out of camaraderie. No, both boys just refused to let the other move ahead and take the lead. Further, neither would look at the other.

The silence was tense. And _awkward_.

Naturally Naruto felt compelled to break it. "So." he started, still looking ahead.

Russell's head twisted in the fox faunus' direction, before quickly looking ahead again.

"Four years of this." Naruto observed.

The mohawk'd teen stayed silent.

"... That would suck." Naruto decided.

It took a while but eventually he earned a response. "Yeah." Russell answered sharply.

"Right?" Naruto asked, finally looking at the other boy. "So here's my thought. How about we bury the hatchet, ya know? I forgive you for makin' my year at Signal a constant headache, you forgive me for... Whatever it is you think I did to wrong you. Bein' a faunus, I guess." he hedged, glancing away as he scratched behind an ear.

The other boy worked his jaw to the side, considering. "... Alright." he nodded as he stopped walking, Naruto doing the same and facing him. "Alright. You wanna have this out now? We can do that. _I don't trust you_." he said firmly, poking the faunus in the chest. "Here's what I know about you, Naruto Fox. You started Signal in your final year. No history, no weapon, no gear, no fighting style, just your semblance. And yet you get put ahead right to the front of the pack. Ahead of all the people training to do this for _years_. And _yeah_, you're a faunus. I got a problem with that. Because all I hear about faunus is those freaks in the White Fang gunning down people in the street! And that on top of everything else makes me wonder why you're _really here."_

"Huh." Naruto responded eloquently. "Well here was me thinkin' you were just an asshole who hated faunus. See? We already understand each other better!"

Russell just waited for a real answer with narrowed eyes.

"Okay. We'll do the cliff notes of my life story. But let's walk an' talk 'cause this could take a while." the faunus suggested, starting to do just that.

"So, grew up in Atlas. Don't know if you've ever been but it's a bad place to be for faunus. No real paying work, no schooling (unless you get _real_ lucky), a lot of the time no housing either. And just about everyone there hates faunus. One day I get cornered by some humans. They were teenagers and I was, like, five. It's how I got these." he explained, pointing to his whisker marks and tracing one. "Mark of the Beast, they call it over there. Anyway... That _experience_ is how I unlocked my semblance and I used it to escape. Then... Let's skip ahead a bit. About a year and a half ago I'm in charge of getting food for the group of faunus I'm looking after. We basically... Well, _literally_ live in a hole in the ground. While I'm doing that some humans catch wind of me and go faunus hunting. One used to be a huntsman and uses his weapon to clear out a huge section of dirt. He doesn't find us but he _does_ find a whole mess of Grimm digging a tunnel for a future incursion attempt." Looking back he noticed Russell's doubting look. "Hey, you can look this up later. Or ask Ozpin about it. He knows the whole story."

"Anyway, I'd been following these guys in case they found our home and when I saw the Grimm I got my family outside and I went to help fight. The huntsman was surprisingly okay with it given he'd been trying to kill me before that, ya know? After it's all over, I get locked up for 'conspiring with the Grimm' (still don't know how you do that) and my family get taken by the SDC for 'community service'."

"Okay, okay, _come on_." Russel interrupted. "There's no way they'd blame a Grimm attack on people. Aren't you trying a little too hard to play the victim here?

In response Naruto levelled a deadpan stare at the boy. "Five minutes ago you were labelling me a terrorist for 'going to school'. It's _real_ easy to paint a faunus as a monster."

Russell opened his mouth to retort but found he didn't have one. "Withdrawn."

Naruto rolled his eyes. "Again, this is all still public record. Both Schnee painting me as the villain and the huntsman basically calling him a moron in his own... 'special' way. Moving on." he said with finality as he started walking again.

"At some point Headmaster Ozpin got wind of all this. Don't ask me how. Hell, ask _him._ I wouldn't mind knowin'. I guess he likes to scout students sometimes when he wants someone for Beacon but they wouldn't normally go. He pulled some strings, got my family to Vale with paying work, got me exiled from Atlas and brought me here too. I guess he thought the effort was worth a trained huntsman with my semblance."

Looking back yet again, all he got was a sceptical look.

"Pull the other one."

And also that.

Naruto let out a quiet growl. "Fine. Everything I've said you can look up. But okay. _Point proving time_." he said firmly before putting his hands together. In a wave of smoke, the blond and the mohawk were surrounded with identical copies of Naruto. "Scout the forest. _All of it_." he ordered, the clones immediately scattering in different directions.

_Two minutes later_

"Ruby Rose and the Schnee heiress just set a tree on fire. That way."

Russell looked in the direction Naruto was pointing and saw smoke rising.

_Thirty seconds later_

"Some guy with a pink streak in his hair just killed a Tajitu."

_Three minutes later_

"There's a cave in... _that _direction." Naruto pointed. "That guy who threw up on the airship and some girl I'm... _pretty sure_ I saw on a cereal box once are going in."

"Oh, you mean Pyrrha Nikos?!" Russell asked, suddenly excited. "Man, she's hot."

Running the memories back, Naruto nodded in agreement. "_Yuuuup_." Suddenly another wave of memories hit him. "Ah, lucky!" he exclaimed. "We're a little off course. The relics are this way. Looks like we might be the first ones there."

-(-)-

"So what's your deal, anyway? Isn't all that stuff heavy?" Cardin asked his new partner. He felt like even he would have trouble with all the equipment he was seeing on the girl. And he was sure it was a girl. The voice was a dead giveaway. Not only was it a girl's voice, it was a _girly_ girl's voice.

"Nah, don't you worry about me, big guy! I've been training in this getup for a couple of years now. No problem!" came the chirpy reply from the ominous mass of metal and whatever else it was made of.

"So what inspired it?"

"Oh!" she giggled. "You can blame Daddy for that. There was a-" her voice hitched slightly, "An _incident_. And from then on he got a _little_ overprotective. So he borrowed some heavy insulating padding from the Fire Station and got a friend to, ah, 'misplace' some pieces of their heavy riot armour. Put it all together and you get the Solid Smoke Suit! Most huntresses go for being an unstoppable force, _I_ am the immovable object!" she finished proudly.

Huh." Cardin shrugged. "Alright. Maybe we should hustle. Who knows how many relics there are."

Inside her armour, Topaz smirked. With a giggle, she holstered her weapon, an ungainly contraption of hoses and valves connected directly to her armour, and took off running. "Race ya!"

Cardin blinked in surprise at how fast she could move before grinning and giving chase.

-(-)-

Naruto looked out at the ruins in puzzlement. He saw the relics and true to his theory, he recognised them on seeing them. But something still felt off. "Is it me or does this seem weird to you too?" he asked.

"What's weird about it?" his partner asked, inspecting the relics on the plinths.

"I mean, doesn't it feel anticlimactic?" Naruto pressed. "We're in a forest supposedly filled with Grimm. Ozpin was all 'kill or be killed'. But... Nothing. No ursa, no beowolves, not even any of those little mole bastards!"

"What you're doing right now, that's called tempting fate, Fox." Russell observed before cocking his head to the side. "Mole bastards?"

"Those mole Grimm, the diggy ones?" Naruto 'clarified, walking toward the relics. Seeing the still confused look on his partner's face he shook his head. "Trust me, they're bastards." Looking through the different relics, he sighed. 'Chess. Not my game.' Shrugging, he picked one up. "Alright, job done. Let's go."

In mid-reach, Russell looked at his partner, back to the relic, and shrugged. "Alright."

As the two stepped away from the plinths, another wave of memories struck the fox faunus. "Huh. Looks like we have company." he told his partner as he looked up to the cliff nearby.

"Hey, Whiskers!" Yang Xiao Long shouted as she waved from the cliff.

"You really shouldn't call him that." her new partner said quietly, not even needing to look at the target's expression to know it would be taken poorly.

"Ah, lighten up a little, Blake!" the blonde chided before jumping down the small cliff with practiced ease.

Taking a deep breath in, Naruto nodded. "Yep, that's our cue to leave." he said quietly. "There's the relics, have fun girls!" he said louder before pointedly walking away.

"Geez, rude." Yang groused, watching the two walk off. Next to her Blake sighed, knowing she would need to explain something awkward now.

Not far away, yet another reunion was happening.

And not a good one.

"Hey, Naruto!" Topaz waved.

Following after, a familiar red haired boy in armour ran into the clearing. "Oh, hey Russ, how's it- Oh, man!" he cut himself off as he spotted the blond. "Russ did you draw the short straw or _what!_ How's pet ownership treating you?"

-(-)-

A/N: Huh. That was a quick turnaround on this chapter. Should I bother posting it on New Year's Eve? Who reads fanfiction on New Year's Eve? I'll hold off until tomorrow.

…

…

… DAMN MY POOR IMPULSE CONTROL!

Alright. So I actually went back and fixed some minor canon inconsistencies in the first couple chapters. Most significantly, Jankin Schnee is now the appropriate to canon: Jacques Schnee. And the family history is more in line with canon with Winter being a problem child, Weiss being a future problem child and Whitley being the golden boy.

Also, forgot to really advertise last update but we have a new show on the Fandom Flux channel that is actually relevant! Basically me and my buddy KingofZeroX watch RWBY from the start and give our impressions of it. Me as someone who knows his shit, him as someone who gave up watching after a few episodes and gave up. It's called Zero Interest. Check it out.

Thanks for reading and happy new year.


	10. Chapter 10

"Woah woah, wanna run that by me again?" Naruto tried to say.

Cardin spoke over him. "I wasn't talking to you, furball. Russ, make sure you get this thing neutered so he doesn't get so agitated."

Naruto was stunned speechless. It had been a long time since a human mouthed off to him like this. It had come as a surprise that no one had done it in Vale. And in Atlas he avoided humans _because_ talk like this would happen. And when talk like this happened... Well, he hadn't been the helpless faunus in a _long_ time and he was often happy to prove it. As the saying goes, them were fighting words.

But funnily enough, he didn't feel like fighting this time. All he could do was "Bwahahaha! Oh, I'mma kick your ass later for that but it was pretty funny!"

"_I wasn't. Talking. To you. Freak._" Cardin said in what would be an intimidating tone were it not for his constantly cracking voice. On the other hand, his looming was working wonders. Easily passing six feet tall and with a muscular build, he loomed over the smaller fox faunus menacingly.

Naruto cocked his head to one side, trying to decide if throwing down would be worth it to put the larger boy in his place. Then, a look of slight fear passed over his face, disappearing quickly. The fox shrugged and walked around the armoured redhead.

Russell stayed where he was, not really knowing what to do. Then he heard the vacating faunus shout over his shoulder, "Have fun with the giant grimm coming this way, big guy!"

Cardin scoffed, rolling his eyes. "Tch. Giant grimm. A faunus telling lies. What a shock, right Russ? … Russ?" he questioned, having looked back to find Russ wasn't there. Looking around he saw the mohawked teen jogging after the faunus.

"Later, Cardin!" Russell shouted over his shoulder. Either Naruto was lying to save face or he wasn't. But from what Russell had seen there was a good chance the blond was telling the truth and it wasn't a risk worth taking just to see Cardin make everyone uncomfortable.

-(-)-

"So Miss Rose and Miss Schnee are hanging from a Nevermore in flight, Miss Nikos is fleeing from a Deathstalker and Mister Fox is of the opinion he and Mister Thrush are being tracked by another large grimm." Glinda Goodwitch listed off as she moved through different camera feeds on her scroll. "Oh, and Mister Lie and Miss Valkyrie have slain a King Tajitu and an Ursa, respectively. Not to mention the small army of minor grimm the other students have battled through. This years initiation is a surprisingly lively event, wouldn't you say, Professor Ozpin?"

"Mm." Ozpin hummed in response as he sipped his coffee. "We have been observing an increase in grimm activity recently. It isn't all that surprising that it is also true here, even this close to Beacon." In his other hand, his own scroll beeped, the screen showing another relic had been taken and by whom. "Oh, dear."

"Hm?" Glinda looked at Ozpin expectantly. In answer, he turned his own scroll to face her, showing her the first confirmed team. "Oh, dear."

-(-)-

"So... Is there _actually_ a giant grimm or...?" Russell asked hesitantly.

"There _was_ one." Naruto answered, Russell breathing a sigh of relief. "Now there are _three_. That cave I talked about before? The one that Pyrrha girl found? Giant scorpion grimm inside and chasin' them right to the relics. And Ruby and the Schnee heiress are... Well," he pointed as he continued to run. Russell turned in the direction the faunus was pointing and saw high in the sky a Giant Nevermore. And a pair of red and white shapes in its talons. "Yeah." Naruto continued. "Don't know how that happened but one of my clones saw those two get taken up. Hope Ruby comes out of it okay."

"And Schnee?" Russell asked not wanting to ask about the thing Naruto was avoiding.

"Eh."

There was an awkward silence. Finally, Russell felt obliged to ask. "And the third?"

"The third..." he started before he got another burst of memories. "Is currently killing all of my clones. And it's following us."

The green haired teen immediately unsheathed his daggers. "What is it? How close?"

A tremor shook the ground.

"That close." Naruto answered. "And all my clones saw was a huge pair of jaws. By the way, don't get eaten. It sucks."

"BOSS!" the two of them heard. Looking in the direction of the shout, they saw another Naruto moving their way by hopping from tree to tree. "UP! MOVE UP! IT COMES FROM-!" it shouted in warning before its sentence was cut short. A pair of long, narrow, _enormous_ jaws snatched the unfortunate clone mid-jump. In the same bite, the jaws ripped a chunk out of a tree, enough that the top half of said tree broke off and plummeted to the ground.

A split second for the words to register and the clone's memories to sink in was all it took. "UP! Climb the trees!" Naruto shouted, unsheathing his claws and taking his own advice, using the claws as makeshift pitons. It wasn't long until Russell followed suit, resheathing his daggers and using his own manual agility to climb his own tree, slightly higher than Naruto.

"What do we-" Russell started to say quietly until he saw Naruto putting his finger to his lips. A tense few seconds passed as they waited to see if the grimm would appear again.

That tension was not broken, but multiplied tenfold when another voice broke out. "The hell are you idiots doing in the trees?!" the cracking voice of Cardin Winchester mocked.

"Cardin!" Russell shouted down, "Get into the trees! There's a grimm!"

"Yeah, and I got into _your mom_ last night! Whatever, man! If you wanna play grabass with your pet in the trees that's your business but don't drag m-OH SHIT!" Cardin screamed in alarm as he was tossed in the air in a similar way as he had entered the forest earlier. The jaws of the grimm had risen underneath him and sent him skyward. "WHAT THE SHIT!"

"Yeah, like he said, there's a giant grimm?" Naruto repeated as he watched the redhead try to swat away the jaws of what was now clearly an _enormous_ crocodile grimm with his mace. In truth it looked like the grimm was playing keep-up with the armoured teen. "I mean I figured since it was coming from underground it had to be using sound to track my clones and kill them. That's why we were being quiet." The crocodile tossed Cardin into the air again and opened its jaws wide to snap shut on him. "Well, it looks like you got this handled so we'll just-"

"WOULD YOU SHUT UP AND HELP ME?!" Cardin screamed as he held the jaws open beneath him. Unfortunately for him, this wasn't a cartoon and the immense strength of the crocodile's jaws overcame him quickly. Luckily, the jaws snapping shut flung him outwards rather than inwards, sending the teen sprawling across the dirt and into the trunk of one of the many nearby trees.

Fate seemed to be playing a cruel game with Cardin Winchester today.

-(-)-

"Oh, my! A Gustan!" Ozpin exclaimed, showing an unusual amount of surprise. An amount a majority of people would describe as 'mild'. "I haven't seen one of those since my last visit to Shade. I wonder how it got all the way over here."

"Ambush hunting grimm, if I recall." Glinda added. "Able to move through earth like water but needs to surface to breathe. Many a seasoned huntsman has been caught unawares by one and killed without getting the chance to draw a weapon."

"Indeed." Ozpin agreed. "Fortunately it seems Mister Fox's team had some forewarning. Now all that's left is to see if they can find the most efficient way to destroy it. Or at the very least, escape it." With a swipe of his finger, the Headmaster pulled up a second camera feed next to the one he was watching. "It seems Miss Rose' and Miss Nikos' teams have elected to flee their current aggressors."

"A wise choice." Glinda opined solemnly. "It's good they understand already that the grimm are merely an obstacle. Knowing to put their objective first is commendable."

-(-)-

"I'm not goin' anywhere until I freakin' _murder_ this thing." Cardin hissed from his new place in the boughs of a tree.

"Hey, you wanna start a vendetta with something that could eat _all of us_ in one bite, be my guest. Meanwhile, I'll be working on an escape plan." Naruto crossed his hands and a carbon copy of himself appeared on the ground below him and started running full speed towards Beacon Cliff.

It was eaten almost casually five steps in, the Gustan staying at surface level for a moment, watching those in the trees with its solid red eyes. In turn it gave the boys the chance to study the beast. Black, like all grimm. Bone white plating lined the jaws and the beast's teeth protruded grotesquely out of its mouth. Compared to the jaws, the rest of the Gustan's body seemed comically small, somewhere around a third of the size.

At least, that's what they could see of it, it still being semi-submerged in the earth. As it began to slowly sink once again, it let loose a gurgling, croaking growl.

"Well that was just unsettling." Naruto slumped. "Okay. Fighting this thing and the floor is lava. We need to either stop it hiding-" the croc sank fullly out of view again "like that, or we need to limit where it can rise."

"I can do that last one."

The three boys slowly turned to look for the source of the voice, familiar only to two of them. On yet another, _especially _sturdy-looking tree branch stood Topaz. Her innocent smile conveyed even through her concealing helmet.

The branch she stood on visibly bowed under her.

"I have _so_ many questions." Russell brushed a hand through his mohawk, completely uncomprehending of the circumstance.

"Let's... Just..." Naruto started before immediately giving up. "You can keep it buried?"

"Totally!" she chirped, presenting her weapon. "This little baby is a modified, dust-powered, emergency service issue fire extinguisher!" At receiving only blank looks, she explained further. "It sprays a dust-reactive gel that adopts the property of the dust being used. Usually it's ice dust for putting out fires. But I modified it to have multiple chambers so it can do that _and-" _she paused, rotating a dial around the barrel firing at the ground below her.

What came out was not a freezing gel. Instead it more closely resembled napalm.

Pre-lit napalm.

Sprayed on woodland underbrush.

"That... I'm from a cold climate. Will that spread?" Naruto asked, haltingly.

"Naaaah." Topaz waved off the possibility. Below her the flames spread to a bush. "I mean... Probably not." The fire spread to another bush in the opposite direction. "There's only so much ground it could cover, right? I mean _sure_ if something were to start spreading it around-"

Attracted by the voice above, the Gustan surfaced directly into the patch of gel, its menacing growl turning into an agonised roar. In panic and pain, it flailed its head around trying to put out the inextinguishable flame by smashing it into whatever it could find. Such as trees, long grasses and other foliage.

Topaz wilted under Naruto's glare. "We should go."

-(-)-

"Well that was..." Ozpin began but failed to follow it with anything.

"They set the forest on fire." Glynda said flatly.

"Well, yes." the headmaster admitted. "But it worked." he added with a half-shrug to his deputy. She merely glared at him in response. "I'll... just call Barty and have him put it out, then."

"I think that would be best, sir."

-(-)-

"Huh." Naruto said, taking in the spectacle before the four of them.

The Gustan no longer a concern for them, the four new students of Beacon headed back towards the cliff to finish their initiation. In doing so, they caught the tail end of the fight occurring there. One one side of the now even more ruined ruins, four students including Pyrrha Nikos had managed to kill a giant scorpion grimm with its own stinger. On the other side, Ruby Rose was decapitating a giant bird. After running up a cliff face.

As if in contrast, Naruto turned to look at the path they came from. The orange glow of the forest fire they accidentally started still visible.

"Anyone else feelin' kinda... What's the word..." Naruto paused in thought.

"Inadequate?" Russell suggested, glum.

"Yeah. That." Naruto agreed, mirroring Russell's mood.

"Nah." Cardin shrugged. "I'm pretty awesome."

Naruto scoffed. "You keep tellin' yourself that the _next_ time you get eaten by a crocodile."

"I'd say 'bite me' but I don't want rabies."

"You don't need me to bite you anyways. Crocodile's got you covered."

There was an awkward pause as Cardin adopted a contemplative expression. "Good one." he said eventually, sounding genuinely impressed.

Then he punched the fox faunus in the back of the head and walked toward the cliffs.

-(-)-

"Ruby Rose, Weiss Schnee, Blake Belladonna, Yang Xiaolong."

The initiation was complete. All the new students that were going to return with relics had done so. And so what followed a handful of hours later was the team formation ceremony. Held on stage in the auditorium it was witnessed by staff and all returning students of Beacon Academy. A true welcome for the next generation of huntsmen and huntresses.

"You retrieved the white knight pieces." Headmaster Ozpin continued. "From this day forth you will be known as Team RWBY! Led by Ruby Rose!" he announced, receiving polite applause from all in attendance.

Their part in the ceremony complete, the four girls moved back, replaced by a group consisting of two boys and two girls.

"Jaune Arc, Nora Valkyrie, Pyrrha Nikos, Lie Ren. You four retrieved the white rook pieces. From this day forth you will be known as Team JNPR! Led by... Jaune Arc!" the headmaster announced again.

"Wha? M-Me?!" the so-named blond boy asked as he pointed to himself.

"Congratulations, young man." Ozpin said, smiling slightly.

Sharing in that congratulations, Pyrrha playfully punched her new leader on the arm, accidentally knocking him to the ground. With a sheepish smile, she helped him to his feet and nudged him back with the rest of their team. Making room for... a rather less jovial group.

A golden haired fox faunus with a look of begrudging acceptance. A boy with a green mohawk who seemed to be appreciating the celebration as much as he could, given the circumstances. A bear faunus girl who had adopted a posture and expression that showed she had closed herself off entirely. And a tall red-haired boy glaring daggers at the lone girl.

"Naruto Fox, Cardin Winchester, Topaz Smoke, Russell Thrush. The four of you retrieved the black bishop pieces. From this day forth you will be known as Team NCTR! Led by Naruto Fox!"

As though a switch had been flipped, Cardin's eyes moved from the bear faunus to his left to the fox faunus on his right. The look on his face screamed if he could get away with snapping the blond's neck right then and there, he would.

-(-)-

Gustan (pronounced Goo-Stahn): Crocodile variety of Grimm. Most common in the deserts surrounding Vacuo, Gustan are ambush predators, capable of devouring a human in a single bite with only a fraction of a second of warning. Their ability to move through earth means any humans walking the sands must remain on guard at all times. Based on the Roald Dahl story "The Enormous Crocodile" and named for the giant crocodile "Gustave", rumoured to have killed 300 people.

A/N: So I was sitting on this chapter for a while at about 1500 words. Right before Topaz popped up again. I had already outlined in my notes how her weapon worked and that she could use it to force the Gustan into a more straight up fight. But then I thought "that's basically napalm. In a forest." The idea of a fight scene happening evaporated instantly. So instead of NCTR being a team of super badasses like RWBY and NPR, they're more on the level of normal first year students. Worth noting, though. They're also not going to be the pointless, waste-of-character, cannon fodder CRDL were used as. So yeah. Skilled fighters but they make dumb mistakes sometimes.

And yes I am quite proud for coming up with a truly valid team name that follows all the rules. Even the implied ones! Leader name first, first names only, is a colour, the name is even a shade of orange to match its leader! Go me!

Usual plug. Fandom Flux youtube channel. We do podcasts about writing and also a show where we review RWBY episode by episode. We're just over halfway through season 2 right now.

Thanks for reading.


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